
Class 
Book.. 










Gwnght'N .. 



CfiESRIGHT DEPOSm 



THE 
SUPER-ICARUS 



BY 

LESLIE REISER 




Boston 

The Roxburgh Publishing Company 

Inc. 






Copyright, 1920 

By LESLIE REISER 

Rights Reserved 



MAY -8 1320 



©CI.A566915 



Dedicated to the Lucifer spirits, 

who, Icarus-wise, 

have flown too near the sun 



INTRODUCTION 

This chiaroscuro was written before Amer- 
ica's entry into the War, and since the 
Author's return from France several modi- 
fications were found necessary. Principles 
and concepts then in the balance are now no 
longer subject to dispute. Thus, the vali- 
dity of a moral critique in application to the 
conduct of nations is no longer a moot ques- 
tion. But, on the other hand, how does the 
ascendency of the principle of right over 
might transvalue the significance of Indivi- 
dualism? 

On that score the author has not found it 
necessary to eliminate the Nietzschean motif 
embodied, holding with John Dewey that the 
accounting for the intellectual attitude of 
Germany by reference to Nietzsche is super- 
ficial. In truth, it seems that were the 



German people a race animated by the 
Nietzschean principles of individualism, the 
present War would have been impossible, 
for then the patriotism elevated to a religion 
would have been incompatible with the ten- 
dencies of the individualism which precludes 
the subordination of self to a higher author- 
ity. In the application of the principles of 
the individual to the State most authors fall 
into the error of overlooking the " reversing 
layer." 

The introduction of the theory of vibra- 
tion needs an apology rather than an intro- 
duction. In the words of the late Dr. Paul 
Carus to the author, "these theories are over- 
worked by people who have created in my 
conception, a kind of prejudice. They have 
been treated by mystics and Oriental sages 
who have made ether vibrations almost ri- 
diculous, at least in my opinion, and it is 
rather difficult to treat the real scientific 
truth of vibration theories.' ' The present 
author here attempts to treat the "real 
scientific truth of vibration theories." 



vi 



As the reader knows, the hyper-space con- 
cept is not new, but the treatment of the 
superman concept from the angle of psycho- 
analysis is rather novel. 

To embody these, our contemporary in- 
tellectual achievements, in the significant, 
and not merely arbitrary dramatic form 
chosen is a difficult undertaking, and we 
leave it to the reader to judge the success of 
the attempt. 



vn 



THE SUPER-ICARUS 

"Swift, through some trap mine eyes have never found* 
Dim-panelled in the painted scene of Sleep, 
Thou, giant Harlequin of Dreams, dost leap 
Upon my spirit's stage. Then Sight and Sound, 
Then Space and Time, then Language, Mete and 
Bound, 

And all familiar Forms that firmly keep 

Man's reason in the road, change faces, peep 
Betwixt the legs and mock the daily round. 
Yet thou can'st more than mock — sometimes my tears 

At midnight break through bounden lids — a sign 
Thou hast a heart; and oft my little leaven 
Of dreams-taught wisdom works me better years. 

In one night witch, saint, trickster, fool divine, 
I think thou'rt Jester in the Court of Heaven." 

Sidney Lanier. 



Vlll 



The Super-Icarus 



I 



The afternoon wears on. With the silence 
of death the lengthening shadows steal 
across the houses and melt into the deeper 
darkness — like a transit of Venus. The 
fleeting forms and muffled shadows lend a 
mystery to the gathering dusk. The antique 
buildings and ancient cathedrals, with their 
storied windows and grotesque figures be- 
come peculiarly impressive in the autumnal 
twilight. I wander on, fascinated by the 
melancholy suggestiveness of the scene. En- 
veloped by silence and loneliness, I sense the 
presence of the great unknown. I stop and 
gaze upon a solemn cathedral as it lifts its 
spires into the multicolored effects of the sky, 
distilled from the crucible of the infinite by 
some heavenly alchemy. The rose window, 
limned with the dust of ages, adds a remote 

1 



THE SUPER-ICARUS 

"Swift, through some trap mine eyes have never found* 
Dim-panelled in the painted scene of Sleep, 
Thou, giant Harlequin of Dreams, dost leap 
Upon my spirit's stage. Then Sight and Sound, 
Then Space and Time, then Language, Mete and 
Bound, 

And all familiar Forms that firmly keep 

Man's reason in the road, change faces, peep 
Betwixt the legs and mock the daily round. 
Yet thou can'st more than mock — sometimes my tears 

At midnight break through bounden lids — a sign 
Thou hast a heart; and oft my little leaven 
Of dreams-taught wisdom works me better years. 

In one night witch, saint, trickster, fool divine, 
I think thou'rt Jester in the Court of Heaven." 

Sidney Lanier. 



Vlll 



The Super-Icarus 



The afternoon wears on. With the silence 
of death the lengthening shadows steal 
across the houses and melt into the deeper 
darkness — like a transit of Venus. The 
fleeting forms and muffled shadows lend a 
mystery to the gathering dusk. The antique 
buildings and ancient cathedrals, with their 
storied windows and grotesque figures be- 
come peculiarly impressive in the autumnal 
twilight. I wander on, fascinated by the 
melancholy suggestiveness of the scene. En- 
veloped by silence and loneliness, I sense the 
presence of the great unknown. I stop and 
gaze upon a solemn cathedral as it lifts its 
spires into the multicolored effects of the sky, 
distilled from the crucible of the infinite by 
some heavenly alchemy. The rose window, 
limned with the dust of ages, adds a remote 

1 



The Super-Icarus 

dignity to the dissolving forms of flying 
buttresses and marble images. . . . 

I wander on in the gathering gloom. The 
mournful leaves swirl about like ghosts of 
souls that are no more. The tongues of 
flame flicker from the crucible of the sun and 
finger the cosmos, and sink again into the 
crater — and night draws on. Only the 
trees sigh, and the flitting phantoms wearily 
drag their fading feet through the murmur- 
ing leaves. Momentarily, a synagogue is 
illumined in the red glow, like a city in Hell, 
and then dissolves into a hazy vapor. . . . 

I wonder at the meaning of it all. . . . 
These forms and remnants of an ancient cul- 
ture whisper the pathos of time — the doom 
of dissolution in eternity. Vastness, remote- 
ness and inscrutible mystery! These forms of 
crystalized conception softened in the nim- 
bus of twilight melancholy — these too will 
pass away! Dust to Dust! . . . Ah, well! 
we are all engulfed in the vortex of time — 



The Super-Icarus 

the recession of the tidal wave of civiliza- 
tion. 

I roam the unreal streets. I mark the 
debris of life that lists in the trough of even 
this remnant of civilization's soul. . . . The 
darkness thickens and clots, and still I roam 
the silent streets, stricken with the nameless 
vacancy that forebodes the doom of death. 

The moon gleams misty through the deep- 
ening fog, and stillness grows apace. The 
sinister night blends its monster breathing 
with the wail of the surf, the eerie shout of 
the sea osprey, and the sour smell of human- 
ity. The languor of autumn and the luxury 
of the exotic day are no more. 

Out of the murk of the night, into the 
abysm of the gloating darkness above, a 
tremulous cry arises — a child in plaintive 
tone echoes the cry of the night wind — 
and suffering humanity trembles on the 
threshold of mystery. But the voice 
of Eternity is dumb. The stolid sphinx 



The Super-Icarus 

sardoncially grins, and Buddha winks his third 
eye. A phantom rises from the repining 
surf, and like a pall, the drifting veil of mist 
lays its baleful mantle over the town. The 
swish of the sea and the murk of the night 
cling like mud. 

The ashy sadness freezes me. ... I look 
into the depths. . . . The clouds gather, 
and the stars close their eyes. ... I shiver. 
. . . The cold rain begins to fall. ... By 
a curious perversity I seek refuge in the Cafe, 
returning to the rabble like a dog to his vomit, 
and try to drown my wretchedness in smoke 
and thick vapors, and the scream of the 
violin. . . . 

My mind reverts to the Inferno — and I 
curse Strindberg, the maniac, and laugh at 
Nietzsche, the insane. My God! . . . That 
I might only drift into the purple dreams of 
a nocturne of Chopin! . . . That I could 
once more steep myself in one of Millet's 
peasants! . . . Damn Strauss! ... I am super- 



The Super-Icarus 

saturated with the noisome ferments rising 
from the decay of dead souls! ... I long 
for the days when I worshipped Emerson and 
imitated Walt Whitman. . . . 

I retrace my soul's metamorphosis. Oh! 
it was all very clear! — natural steps in the 
unfolding of a Superman. Theological dog- 
matism, then Paine and Ingersoll, and with 
them Agnosticism, followed Atheism, then 
Mysticism and Buddhism. Then Schopen- 
hauer and Pessimism — and Nietzsche and 
the Ubermensch! ... I was a Superman! 
Even now I could hear the Raven-croakings 
of the souls whom I had condemned to in- 
cessant suffering. . . . Yes, I was a Super- 
man — I had been beyond good and evil, I, 
myself had suffered intensely and silently, as 
a Superman should — I had followed Oscar 
Wilde and sounded all the depths of De 
Profundis. I could relate a tale, though 
told by an idiot, that would make Baude- 
laire and Verlaine seem like mere literature, 



The Super-Icarus 

arouse the jealousy of Machiavelli — Max 
Stirner would turn over in his grave! . . . 
What was I now? Where was that Diony- 
sian enthusiasm that chanted of suffering, 
sang of the Will to Power, and echoed Thus 
Spake Zarathustra! . . . Like Shelley, beat- 
ing the luminous void in vain? I reflected 
that I would at least make a good study for 
Rodin. . . . 

With "the philosopher with a hammer," 
I strove to demolish creeds, convictions, 
and sentiment. But instead of shaking the 
world of tradition, I had only ruptured the 
delicate mechanism of my own mentality. 
Like a soulless monster, a philosophic Frank- 
enstein, I sought revenge — but the scales 
were already tipping in favor of Nemesis. 
. . . This brought the terrible subject up 
— it tormented me day and night — The 
Everlasting Return! Damn Nietzsche! — I 
wonder if it's true? . . . 



The Super-Icarus 



II 



Out of the rain and the night, into the 
noise-suffused cafe of dim lights, came a man. 
The pale, peering face surveyed the riotous 
scene in a dazed manner. . . . The gleaming 
eyes searched out a corner, and the man 
came toward me. His eyes encountered 
mine, and a ray of relation passed between us. 
I thought of a remark of Carlyle in speaking 
of De Quincey, "This man has been in Hell." 
With eyes that might have belonged to a 
somnambulist, and a shaggy face gauged 
with lines that reminded me of stony cliffs 
chiseled into by the weathering agencies, and 
the general appearances of some bohemian 
Jew — I was interested in the personality 
behind the mask. 

My friend seated himself beside me with a 
weary sigh — yet I could not but be struck 



The Super-Icarus 

with his air of triumph, the conquering 
gleam of a dreamer with the will to power 
to objectify his titanic conceptions. I might 
best describe that evidently intellectual man 
by stating that he wore a countenance 
characterized by an "absorbed pain." But 
tonight he was drunk with the nectar of the 
gods. . . . 

"A bad night," he observed in an abstract 
way. 

"Yes, one might suppose that the heavens 
weep in pity for humanity," I replied. 

"Such speech might come from one who 
has sounded the sea of experience — mostly 
the shoals." — This with a penetrating 
glance. 

"I have played upon all the chords of that 
sensitive lyre, the soul, but it seems that 
only discord arises where the musician plays 
from the notes of experience." 

"Life is a delicate instrument . . . human- 
ity has but sounded the minor chords . . . 

8 



The Super-Icarus 

but the music of the future is supended in the 
air above, awaiting the master hand that 
is to bring it into being." 

This irritated me, and I ejaculated: 

"You say that with the air of a prophet — 
but what is your justification? For myself, 
I early in life had such illusions dispelled. . . . 
I may be wrong. ..." 

"My friend, have you ever trembled with 
the kinetic infinitudes of thought which you 
think might have come from above? As 
you see, I am all a-tremble with the weight 
of an overwhelming discovery. I must re- 
lease the tension. . . . The world must know 
in time, anyway. — You invite me to make 
you my first confidant." 

This speech was delivered in that solici- 
tous tone which always reminds me of the 
clergyman who kindly asks you about your 
welfare and your "soul salvation." I re- 
plied in no uncertain terms — 

"Do you know to whom you speak? May 



The Super-Icarus 

not such confidence prove the worse to you? 
It is for the best that you enlist into your 
cause one whom popes have named, The 
Antichrist,' and who to society at large has 
been the shatterer of idols, a pagan, an 
iconoclast who preaches the Superman, and 
is the foe of illusion!" 

"Then you are the one whom I would first 
convert. I greet you Herr Feuerberg. . . . 
I am Max Minnette." 

"What mystery is this you utter?" 
"Know then — I have, like Orpheus, de- 
scended into the very depths of Hades, and 
wrung, like him, by the magic of genius, the 
soul of beauty from the crucible of suffering 
and brought it into light. I have snatched 
the suspended music of the future from the 
ether! I am the master hand. ... I bring 
into the realm of consciousness the most 
ravishing music, the sublimest harmonies, the 
cosmic symphonies, the music of the crystal 
spheres, and the overtones of struggling, suf- 

10 



The Super-Icarus 

fering humanity, in the most marvelous : in T 
vention of the century!" 

The eyes of the fiend burned with the sub- 
merged fires of a demon. I reflected. . . , 
My duty is clear. . . . Was I not Vthe 
philosopher with a hammer?" Society is 
cumulative disillusionment — hence it is a 
vast tragedy. I would do in a night what 
society would do in a longer time, and with 
more precision. I would dispel the illu- 
sions of this incarnation of the absolute! 

"Once I was as you are now, my friend, 
though younger than you then, and like 
yourself, I entered life with the spirit of 
Brand — ever higher, the determination to 
storm the very gates of heaven — though 
we differ in the method of accomplishing such 
an end. Man is a bridge, I said, he is but a 
mean between the worm and the Man-god. 
. . . That was long ago. . . . Now, like 
a disembodied Manfred, I roam the face of 
the globe. ... In the solitary silence of my 

11 



The Super-Icarus 

eminence I look abroad the desolate path of 
life, I look into the depths of the profound 
abyss above — I have no choice — I scorn 
the "incorrigible mob of humanity," cursing, 
toiling, hating, striving and love-deluded — 
I am despondent of any advance, progress is 
illusion — so I retire into the ruins of a once 
magnificant temple, and here I dwell amidst 
the crumbling edifices and decaying ruins, 
which cast their deep shadows across the 
kingdom of the mind — I am dumb with the 
mystery of it all." 

. . . "Come, let us go! Why should I 
describe what can be directly experienced. 
You have long sought an answer to the spir- 
itual riddle of the sphinx — tonight, it is 
given you to realize what the dreams of your 
youth idealized. The subtlest mystic, as 
well as the grossest materialist, will faint in 
the spiritual ecstacies of the dream-tones 
which no Wagner ever conceived of." 

Indeed, it seemed to me, I was on the 

12 



The Super-Icarus 

verge of some new wonder. Here is an 
original specimen for Lombroso. Perhaps 
another Gambara — or a Strauss! Abso- 
lute Music! Shades of Pythagoras! 

We left the cafe. ... I to meet the most 
tremendous experience ever dealt out to man 
— Minnette to the precipitous fall of a soar- 
ing soul, crushed at the base of the crag of 
disillusionment. As we left, I recalled the 
greatest truth ever uttered by man, "For 
illusionment, you know, is the stimulating 
principle," and I wished that Ibsen had 
spoken to me earlier in life. 

We hesitated before plunging into the rain 
and darkness. — We sallied forth; I at the 
side of the quick and nervous Minnette. On 
the way we were silent, each busy with his 
own thoughts — I, wondering at this strange 
personality, with his dominant manner, yet 
simple and childlike faith, his eccentricities, 
wild eyes and mystic manner — was he a 
mere dreamer, or a poor, deluded poet gone 
daffy over his art? 

13 



The Super-Icarus 

After a few minutes' walk we came to a 
side street, filthy and dark; and turning 
down this narrow street, we stopped be- 
fore an old but rather attractive house — 
attractive because of the melancholy beauty 
associated with all ruins ^- and which Min- 
nette chose to call his home. He led the 
way up two flights of' stairs that groaned 
their ancient troubles to the darkness as we 
passed over them. At the last landing the 
apostle of the absolute threw open a door 
hanging on rust-encrusted hinges, as I 
judged by the whining which echoed down 
the dark hallway into the saturnine silence of 
the alley without. 

I stumbled through the doorway into the 
room. Minnette switched on an electric 
light which flooded the room with subdued 
brilliancy — and at the same time, sur4 
prised me greatly. The room, for the most 
part, was bare and decidedly chilly. In 
one corner stood an old walnut bedstead, 

14 

i 



The Super-Icarus 

which seemed to be the only valuable article 
in the whole room. Between the two win- 
dows was a work-bench upon which were 
scattered about all kinds of tools, wheels, 
gears, pieces of metal, springs and lenses, be- 
sides the electric apparatus and all the rest 
of the paraphernalia dear to the heart of the 
experimenter. Above this bench a shelf was 
bracketed on the wall, and upon this shelf 
a number of books were to be found. I took 
in all these details in a sweep, and then 
turned my attention to what was of most 
importance, and what was evidently the 
object of our visit. 

In the center of the room was a large table, 
on the top of which was some large body, 
evidently a machine of some sort, covered 
with an oil-soaked piece of silk. The whole 
floor was littered up with shavings and fil- 
ings of all kinds. This was all there was to 
be seen in the room, which had the general 
appearances of some junk shop so popular 

15 



The Super-Icarus 

with the younger generation of mechanical 
dabblers, and which proves the "death" of 
so many tidy housewives. 

At this point in my observations, Min- 
nette, having deposited our outer garments 
on the bed, offered me a dilapidated chair 
and apologized for the lack of fire. 

"You see, I only had a limited sum of 
money for my experiments, and I needed it 
all, so that I cannot afford fuel — besides, 
that is superfluous, for I never notice the 
cold when at work." 

To bring him back to the purpose of the 
visit, I suggested: 

"Don't you think you had better begin at 
the beginning, and tell me what started you 
on your invention, what its purpose is, and 
how it is accomplished — what is absolute 
music?" 

"I will not burden you with the story of 
my life, nor go into my past history; but 
rather start with that period in my life when 

16 



The Super-Icarus 

I became interested in the study of vibration 
and its relation to consciousness." 

"Oh, Lord!" I exclaimed, "are you another 
of those oriental mystics pulsating with 
ethereal vibrations? I have heard them all 
— I am sick of them!" 

"Please hear my story out!" Minnette re- 
torted. "My theories of consciousness were 
stimulated by, and, indeed, are the direct 
outgrowth of the electron theory of the 
physicist. I suppose I always did lean more 
or less to the mystical view of life; even as 
a youth I reveled in the dreamland of meta- 
physics. My ideas were crystalized by a 
study of eastern thought, and it was not long 
before I became absorbed in the idea that 
states of consciousness are merely rates of 
vibration, the lower the vibratory state the 
feebler the consciousness of the individual. 

"I worked out the general principle that 
there are two phases of reality, which in- 
cludes beauty — besides the external forms 

17 



The Super-Icarus 

recognized by the sense organs, there is, in 
the inner reality, the mind, the other phase 
of it, and without both there can be no 
beauty.' ' 

"That is rather a trite conclusion — al- 
most as old as philosophy itself; besides, 
Locke long ago dispelled the idea of innate 
ideas/' I remarked. 

Minnette deigned no reply. 

"I studied every phase; I carried on a vast 
number of experiments to prove or disprove 
my theories. I repeated all the classical ex- 
periments of sound. I extended Tyndall's 
experiments with the flame; I supplemented 
Chaldini's experiments with vibrating plates 
and sand figures — in fact, I believe that 
the universe is built upon vibrations. It is 
nothing but vibrations." 

"Your attempts are nothing but a repeti- 
tion of the experiments of the alchemists. 
You are a modern Paracelsus, I see. Had 
you but taken to heart the lesson of Brown- 

18 



The Super-Icarus 

ning's masterpiece, instead of devouring Bal- 
zac, you would have avoided much useless 
effort, I am sure. Browning's hero, I be- 
lieve, finds that absolute knowledge is un- 
attainable." 

"You ridicule the alchemists — does not 
modern science confirm their belief? More 
than that, I claim to have discovered the 
secret of the transmutation of metals! As 
for Balzac, he was a seer, as far above your 
intellect as you claim to be above the rabble. 
You remember the moral of 'William Wil- 
son?' — 'thou hast murdered thy better 
self!' My path is the only one to the at- 
tainment of the Superman." 

"Take care, you would be another Dr. 
Jekyll? The ancient alchemist, you remem- 
ber, by means of chemicals, tried to trans- 
mute the baser metals into the perfect or 
'virtuous' metals — but he failed. The 
professional taste of Dr. Jekyll led him to 
make a similar attempt with the human 

19 



The Super-Icarus 

being. He conceives the idea of a drug that 
by means of some mental alchemy, will 
transmute his baser personality into the 
higher and purer side, and being successful 
in his experiments, only comes to discover 
that the worm, the conqueror worm, has 
turned. The liberated being becomes a 
Mr. Hyde — a malevolent, misshapen crea- 
ture with passions as evil as they are violent. 
Man, at bottom, is still brute; he is selfish 
and cruel. We are all Frankensteins. We 
all have our Mr. Hydes, who like Franken- 
stein, the soulless monster lacking the 'Prom- 
ethean fire' which makes man a 'spiritual 
being,' only lives to pursue us from sea to 
sea . . . yet we can not escape. Like Je- 
kyll, we are relentlessly followed by the 
implacable vengeance of our evil genius!" 

I delivered this bit of philosophy, the 
culmination of a lifetime of experience in 
disillusionment, with the confidence that be- 
came a Superman. I was happiest when 

20 



The Super-Icarus 

most miserable, for then my convictions were 
confirmed. But my opponent was not so 
easily vanquished. 

"It is useless for you to try to convince 
one whose beliefs are fortified by experience 
— as infallible a guide as any theory nursed 
into being for libidic reasons, or which are a 
poetic perversion of intellectual maschism. 
Your ideas are the result of experience mis- 
interpreted. . . . But hear me through! 

"My invention is constructed on the 
mathematical principle of number. Number, 
in the last analysis, is the underlying princi- 
ple of all beauty. As someone says, music 
is a kind of sensual mathematics. 'God 
Geometrizes,' has been my lever. 

"What is music? It is simply the science 
of rhythmical variations in a certain series 
of vibrations — the mathematical cadences 
of tones, and tones themselves are vibrations. 
The more overtones the more beautiful the 
harmonies. Absolute music is the music that 

21 



The Super-Icarus 

has an infinity of overtones of supplementary 
vibrations. To secure this infinity of over- 
tones it is necessary to run the whole scale 
of vibrations from zero to infinity. 

"Space and time are figments of the human 
mind ; to the cosmic consciousness they do not 
exist; to one who hears the music of the ab- 
solute, matter reverts back to the ether and 
becomes merely a mode of motion. The 
fundamental principles of physics are but 
derivatives of the principles of mind, as 
someone says. The physical universe is an 
illusion. Therein lies the purpose of my in- 
vention — to raise the mentality through 
the inductive principle of absolute music on 
the vibratory scale of consciousness to that 
plane where space and time and matter 
cease to exist! 

"What does that mean? Simply that the 
soul, liberated from the periphery of bodily 
attraction, will soar to heights now unknown, 
probe the infinitudes of space to the anti- 

22 



The Super-Icarus 

podes of the ether. Yes, this and more I 
claim for my invention. We will rise higher 
and higher through the series of finer zones 
to the very throne of the Godhead. We 
will be God Himself! This is absolute 



music 



This last phrase would have thrown me 
into convulsions of laughter, had it not 
paralyzed me for a moment. "We will be 
God Himself!" Uttered with that intense 
enthusiasm which precludes insincerity, I 
asked myself, is this man absolutely insane? 



23 



The Super-Icarus 



III 



I am now surprised at the abruptness of 
the course of events as they happened, the 
irrational succession of thoughts — momen- 
tary flashes of thought from some deep abyss, 
as it were. Held against my will, I could 
not flee from this Ancient Mariner. There 
seemed a deeper meaning and understanding 
beneath the whole, taken for granted on 
both sides, so that what was spoken seemed 
often disconnected. In many cases I anti- 
cipated his thought, and recognized in Min- 
nette stages in my own personality, or rather 
development, resemblances to thoughts which 
I had considered as unworthy of conscious 
belief, and thus suppressed them. 

Here I interposed: 

"Your theories are all very fine, my ec- 
static friend, and they bespeak their oriental 
origin, but have you ever considered that 

24 



The Super-Icarus 

nature abhors an absolute as much as she 
does a vacuum? The universe is ever be- 
coming. Any attempt on the part of man to 
attain to any thing absolute directly, and 
without undergoing the laborious evolution- 
ary processes of becoming, is rigidly opposed 
by nature. Always remember that Man 
and Nature are diametrically opposed. If 
man were to attain to any thing absolute the 
truth that is an end in itself and not relative, 
then the world would melt into a placid sea 
of quiescence; motion, progress and evolution 
would cease, decay and stagnation would re- 
sult. Strife is the father of all things, as 
Heraclitus says. At best I can only believe 
in a Becoming Absolute." 

"Here you are inconsistent. The fact 
that mind and matter are opposed denies 
their identical nature, which you, as a ma- 
terialistic monist, assert. Besides, you take 
the wrong view of the relation of Man and 
Nature. The true philosophy. ..." 

25 



The Super-Icarus 

"But why is it — ," here I stopped, struck 
for the first time, with the absurdity of 
the whole proceedings. Really! a Superman 
becoming heated in a discussion of the abso- 
lute! — Nietzsche versus Tagore! 

Evidently seeing that I was becoming 
fatigued with his idle vaporings, Minnette 
changed his mode of attack. He walked 
over to the table, and with a loving touch 
removed the covering from the machine be- 
neath. With a gleam of supreme triumph, 
Minnette presented it for my inspection. 

The whole thing seemed a meaningless ar- 
rangement of lenses and intricate meshes of 
wires connecting all sorts of coils, trans- 
formers, solenoids and what-not. 

The most conspicuous part of the whole 
apparatus was a crystal sphere that was, 
apparently, translucent and seemed to be 
made of a substance resembling magnetic 
spar. The entire surface of this globe was 
alive with phosphorescing lights, as if it 

26 



The Super-Icarus 

screened millions of scintillating stars. The 
lights seemed to hesitate and tremble with 
desire, and I felt that if the globe were to re- 
volve those nascent colors would be released, 
and palpitating with joy in their new found 
freedom, would radiate in perfect clusters of 
suffusion. 

"I have stolen a march on nature; I have 
won a victory that can not be denied me. 
It is a great gift to humanity. Music is the 
basis of human development, as Plato in- 
timated. My music inspires ideas beyond 
the sensual world; it nullifies the laws of 
matter in making one superior to them. I 
make several claims for this invention. Of 
course, you know, I claim to produce abso- 
lute music by means of it. At the same 
time, this apparatus makes it possible to 
create and transform vibrations in such a 
manner that one can apprehend physical 
sensation, ordinarily translated into con- 
sciousness through the sense organs, and 

27 



The Super-Icarus 

directly convey them to the mind. Thus it is 
possible for anyone deficient in any of the 
senses to communicate with any phase of 
reality, ordinarily denied them because of 
their limitation, by means of this step-up 
transformer. Thus, the blind may see, and 
the deaf hear, and so forth. Furthermore, 
sense experience will be correlated and 
coalesce in such a manner that we can see 
sounds, hear colors and so on. 

4 'On the other hand, while physical sensa- 
tions will be raised to the plane of the psychi- 
cal by means of vibrations, the mental plane 
can be elevated to the extent that the elusive 
'thing-in-itself becomes a direct experience. 
But we need not stop here. It makes it 
possible to attain cosmic consciousness by 
bringing the super-physical realms down to 
man's plane — we shall then become as gods. 

"By tuning himself through the machine 
with another person, direct transmission of 
thought is possible, without the use of a 

28 



The Super-Icarus 

lower medium of transmission. But not 
only will it be possible to communicate with 
man directly, but man will attune himself to 
the plane of lower forms of life and thus ex- 
perience their psychic life. 

"Nor do we need to stop here. On the 
material side there is the possibility of over- 
coming gravity and chemical affinity. As 
you probably know, all phenomena of this 
universe are undulatory in nature, are but 
modes of motion of the substratum of matter. 
Being so, all we need to do is overcome the 
lower forms of vibration with the higher, 
and as electricity overcomes chemical affin- 
ity, so a higher state of vibration can over- 
come gravity. The range of the machine 
makes it possible to create any of those high- 
frequency rays of light, as the 'N' ray or the 
'Lavendar' ray, so popular with pseudo- 
scientific writers, by means of which that 
vast storehouse of intra-atomic energy is 
liberated. The energy of the sunlight will 

29 



The Super-Icarus 

be transmuted into electricity directly, thus 
opening up a whole universe of power. . . . 
The conquest of the stars will cease to be a 
dream. 

"I believe my invention will extend its 
beneficial influence into all phases of exis- 
tence. It will abolish war, its utility in 
agriculture is unlimited, while its regenera- 
tive rays will heal the sick and revivify the 
old and decrepit. It is the philosopher's 
stone realized, the alchemists dream objec- 
tified. 

"The working of the machine depends 
upon an ingenious mechanism whereby it re- 
ceives mechanical impulses transmitted by 
electricity from such devices as selenium 
coils, and tuning forks, that correspond to 
human eyes and ears. The machine consists 
essentially of a series of metal disks having a 
certain number of insulating segments in 
their peripheries, the disks arranged to re- 
volve at a fixed speed, and silver- tipped 

30 



The Super-Icarus 

brushes situated in a position to bear upon 
the contacts of the revolving disks. The 
method of obtaining undamped vibrations, 
so far as sound is concerned, is through 
electro-magnetism. I have worked out this 
principle by means of a mechanism whereby 
a current of electricity is sent through a 
series of magnets, by pressing certain keys, 
and the strings are caused to vibrate in per- 
fect synchronism. 

"Pure music is produced when each string 
vibrates without coming in contact with any 
mechanical device, and thus an absolutely 
pure and sustained tone is emitted. When 
one group of tones forming a chord is super- 
imposed upon another the harmony of the 
two blending tones is simply entrancing. 

"To protect the apparatus from the de- 
structive effects of the high frequency, I 
sought for a substance similar to zircorundum 
in its non-conductive powers, only that it 
was impervious to heat and not subject to 

31 



The Super-Icarus 

disintegration by radiation. This I have 
found. 

"I have also invented a transformer that 
transforms light from a low order in the vibra- 
tory activity to an exceedingly high state. 
This instrument transforms vibrations from 
beyond the ultra-violet light into that vast 
expanse of energy labeled 'unknown' in the 
scientific tables today. Thus I have secured 
a universal range from zero to infinity; from 
the relative to the absolute. 

"A delicate, intricate mass of fine wires 
made of a new chemical composition, but 
which resembles uranium in some respects, 
is affected by ether waves of a certain inten- 
sity which can be transformed into intelligible 
images by means of the series of appliances 
which you see before you, but which you 
would not understand without explanation. 
This screen acts as a mirror by means of 
which music, art, forms and so forth, can be 
made intelligible to those lacking in the 

32 



The Super-Icarus 

proficiency of any of the sense organs. The 
masterpiece of the whole thing is this trans- 
lucent globe. . . ." 

Minnette volunteered no information about 
it, but I observed that it was evidently related 
to the seven disks with concentric circles 
of perforations, which were connected with a 
microphone and amplifiers. 

"I will not go into the details of this machine 
but the few principles I have enunciated will 
serve as analogies for all the phases. I need 
only say that it is the most delicate and sensi- 
tive mechanism in existence. 

"The theory in a broad form is simply 
this: Every equilibrium of nature is sensitive 
to some appropriate excitant. The most 
violent thunderclap will not set up a vibra- 
tion in a tuning fork, but a very slight sound 
of a proper period will suffice to set it in 
motion, and the tuning fork is said to vibrate 
in sympathy. Everything has its keynote, 
including man. It is only necessary to find 

33 



The Super-Icarus 

the keynote and then use this period of vibra- 
tion in its proper amplitude and intensity 
to bridge over the gap between these primary 
forms and secondary forms, through these 
transformers, and the problem is solved." 

With something of reverence and awe, 
Minnette threw on a switch, and, then hesi- 
tating a moment, pressed a button. . . . 

There was little harmony, but pure mel- 
ody — billowy and rhythmical. . . . From 
silence to basic tones the music mounted. 
Pure and continuous was the blend. . . . 
The volume was such that it must surely 
set the stars a-quiver. 

Tone was volatilized into dazzling colors 
of shimmering incandescence that radiated in 
undulations inducing such a palpitating joy- 
ousness, delight and glory, that one almost 
fainted in the voluptuous streams of flowing 
melody. One was plunged into a gamut of 
sensations, an orgy of experience. . . . 

The plaint of the primeval surged into the 

34 



The Super-Icarus 

consciousness from some deep abyss. . . . 
Music, wild and woody, elusive as the rippling 
streams, of playing fountains, misty valleys 
and the thundering oceans. ... A vast 
sea of music as flowing from some cosmic 
cataract, billowing in foam-lipped symphonies, 
succeeding each other in rhythmic cadence. 
Fire-tipped and sublimated, the vast sea of 
ether adumbrations induced successive moods, 
and one felt as though a million struggling 
egos were striving for release to mount like 
Icarus the empyrean and melt into the sun. 
The ashes of antiquity flared up in the myriad 
fire-spheres of phoenix- thoughts ; scenes of 
long forgotten woes, like a panorama of the 
drama of humanity, passed in review. Ances- 
tral wailings, sorrows, joys, struggles, battles, 
despairs — like electric oscillations I felt 
as though torn by a thousand counter- 
tendencies. 

It seemed as though the symphonies would 
sound the very gates of heaven, and pluck 

35 



The Super-Icarus 

from the Almighty Himself the secret of the 
Sphinx. 

Each individual tone trembled and rever- 
berated, and seemed to dance in synchronism. 
Any number of echoes, chimes and tremulo 
effects were secured. . . . 

One witnessed the battle of atoms, and 
heard the pent up cry of travailing nature's 
buried secrets. It seemed as though the 
sounds and colors polarized themselves in 
the very roots of being, and one felt a union 
with every form and substance of the universe. 
I stood at the antipodes of the universe and 
knew the secrets of the nebula, I heard the 
groaning of eons, the diapasonic cataclysms 
of solar systems, the sybillic chaunts of 
agonized nature, antediluvian forms, the 
hidden world of plants, the cry of crystals and 
the acid-flame of minerals — all dissolved 
in the scream of evolutionary desire running 
from the planetary slime to the music of the 
spheres.* 

*"Melomanlacs" by James Huneker. 

36 



The Super-Icarus 

Mounting the scale of infinity with Hertz- 
ian pulsatility, I was surely bathed in the 
Roentgen rays of cosmic consciousness, as I 
listed in the trough, and, like driftwood in the 
tide of music's ethereal seas, swooned with 
the music. 

With bewildering rapidity emotions sup- 
planted one another — love, hate, joy, anger, 
passion, fear and religious frenzy. Immersed 
in a sea of thoughts and phantasies, the in- 
spiration of a Shakespeare, the titanism of a 
Beethoven or a Michael Angelo, the suffering 
of a Prometheus, the gloom of a Poe, and 
the abstraction of a Newton — all in turn 
were mine. 

But as it mounted, the music became, to 
me, more dissonant, and a series of discords, 
screeches, noises and harsh disagreeabilities 
tore me from all directions. Like the rasping 
of files and the boring of teeth, the tones ripped 
into my being and reverberated as though 
they would tear my eyes from their sockets. 

37 



The Super-Icarus 

Madness seized me and I screamed and raved, 
and vomited the froth that evidenced the 
inner conflict. As the grinding point of a 
dentist's needle tears into the living nerve, 
these repercussions shattered me. With one 
supreme effort I felt I could clutch the universe 
in hatred and destroy all in my agony. 
Something snapped — the world whirled 
round in reeling drunkenness . . . and all 
was inky black. 



38 



The Super-Icarus 



IV 



The return of ''consciousness" came like 
the fall of snow — silent and unobtrusive. 
In the silence that was tangible, and a twilight 
fraught with potentialities, where the radiance 
glows ghostly in the shadowy shapes of sym- 
bolisms, I heard the vespers plotting, and felt 
the "beating of the wings of the time spirit." 
Again the curtain arose . . . and I took the 
discussion where it had broken off — 

"You don't seem to be aware of the Prin- 
ciple of Relativity, which is so profoundly 
modifying our views of the universe. First 
of all, I might say, your apparatus can never 
accomplish anything approaching the abso- 
lute, whatever your understanding of that 
may be. Motion, or modes of motion, of any 
kind, but particularly that resulting from 
mechanical apparatus, is produced through 

39 



The Super-Icarus 

friction, and without friction motion is 
impossible. The presence of such a relative 
thing in the attainment of the absolute is 
incompatible with the notions of the uncon- 
ditioned. You are simply guilty of a new 
form of the old fallacy of the Perpetual 
Emotionalists. 

"On the other hand, I shall prove that it is 
the very Principle of Relativity that supports 
my doctrine. Now ..." 

"Wait a minute! Let me argue on your 
own ground. It seems to me that you stand 
in about the same position that Kant did 
with his Categorical Imperatives. You, I 
suppose, are familiar with the accusation 
launched at the German Idealism which 
makes man the measure of all things. With 
the romanticism of a Goethe you are athirst 
for the universal experience to which all 
mankind falls heir. Now then, in you I find 
the reflex of Kant's subjective Idealism: 
Man is a microcosm, an epitome of the 

40 



The Super-Icarus 

universe, in the sense that mind is the criterion 
of reality. The ego is the mirror, or rather 
searchlight, of the universe. In the Agnosti- 
cism of the 'Critique of Pure Reason,' as it 
reappears in Nietzsche, lies the germ of the 
preference for illusion which culminates in the 
subjective limitation of consciousness to the 
extent of Egotism. It is that same spirit 
found throughout German philosophy, that 
individualism which asserts the supremacy 
of the ego as the incarnation of the absolute, 
that transcendentalism which in Schopen- 
hauer appears as Will, and in Hegel, Fichte 
and Leibniz, in other forms — it is that 
Absolute Idealism that has afforded the 
counter-philosopher the weapon to attack 
the absolute and denounce such a philosophy 
in action as 'a double assault upon mankind.' * 
"Yours is nothing but Fichte's Trancen- 
dental Ego with a baptism of Orientalism. 
That I fall into the same category is not to the 

♦"Egotism in German Philosophy," by Santayana. 

41 



The Super-Icarus 

point. I glory in my conquests. But I say 
that your philosophy in the hands of the 
Ubermensch ultimately results in social 
cataclysms. ..." 

"The criticism you have just echoed rather 
proves 'the mark of immaturity, inexperience 
and limited vision' of the critic himself, than 
of the philosophy he presumes to criticize. 
The trouble lies in the fact that you have not 
viewed the thing through the aspect of 
eternity, as Whitman would say. 

"Like many others, you have failed to see 
the significance of the present struggle. The 
philosophy which 'summons all nature to 
minister to self is capable of dual interpreta- 
tion. Is it not strange to you that Emerson — 
as much an Individualist as either Schopen- 
hauer or Nietzsche — should have drawn 
inspiration from Eastern philosophy, the 
same source from which Schopenhauer drew, 
and still have arrived at such a saner line 
of thought and conduct? Don't you know 

42 



The Super-Icarus 

that Nietzsche was strongly influenced by 
Emerson? 

"Yet you have fallen into the same limita- 
tion, 'the only sin,' made the same mistake 
that Nietzsche did. His conception of the 
Superman is altogether off. . . . 

"Man, according to Aristotle, is a political 
animal. Since times immemorial men have 
sought to understand themselves in their 
relation to their fellow man. Humanity as a 
social system involves complex relations be- 
tween the individual and the abstract unity 
which we call the state. The relations existing 
between the two, and the prerogatives of 
either are the problems with which we are 
now concerned. 

"Plato believes of man, as the alchemist 
believed of minerals that there is some Virtue' 
which can be nourished to perfection in its 
resemblances to archetypal forms. But, as 
you know, Plato's beliefs may be summed up 
in the statement that the state is supreme in 

43 



The Super-Icarus 

power, and the individual is subordinate to 
the state. There is one point in Plato that 
bears thought, and that is the emphasis laid 
upon the individual — that the character 
of man appears in the state unchanged. In 
other words: no individual determinism 
without state determinism, the Bible to the 
contrary, notwithstanding. One important 
conclusion may be drawn from The Republic: 
Plato could not outline an ideal state except 
for an ideal people. 

"When the theory of the Conservation and 
Correlation of Energy was formulated, You- 
mans suggested that all forces, social, intel- 
lectual, will force and physical force should 
be correlated into one system which 'must be 
of the profoundest import in relation to these 
great subjects.' He says, 'The forces mani- 
fested in the living organism are of the most 
varied and unlike character, mechanical, 
thermal, luminous, electric, chemical, nervous, 
sensory, emotional and intellectual. That 

44 



The Super-Icarus 

these forces are perfectly co-ordinated — 
that there is some definite relation among 
them which explains the marvelous dynamic 
unity of the living organism, does not admit 
of question. More and more we are perceiv- 
ing that the conditions of humanity and the 
progress of civilization are the direct resultant 
of the forces by which men are controlled.' 

"The principle factor in human life is 
consciousness. All problems of philosophy, 
all theories, and all social systems must 
recognize this fundamental fact of conscious- 
ness — in that we are but a higher form of 
animal, differentiated chiefly from the lower 
forms by a higher form of consciousness. 

"Several axioms, postulates, or general 
principles, become necessary at this point, 
and may be stated as follows : 

(a) The universe tends to arrange itself 
into smaller units possessing relatively inde- 
pendant unity of motion, as Paulsen says. 
In the physical world these units arrange 

45 



The Super-Icarus 

themselves into molecules, atoms and elec- 
trons; in the organic world this fact is mani- 
fested in the tendency to resolve living bodies 
into smaller units, as cells, etc. But, and 
here is an important point, in the mental 
and social world this tendency is not working 
in the direction of the formation of smaller 
units, but of larger ones. 

(b) Society is the sum of these individual 
units. 

(c) Any phenomenon of collective units is 
potential in, and arises from causes found 
latent in these individual units. 

(d) Consciousness is a gradual develop- 
ment in which mind tends toward a higher 
degree of development. 

(e) That the Will to Live is inherent in 
the individual, and not caused by an external 
factor. 

(/) That continuity, 'the scientific watch- 
word,' implies that mind is latent or potential 
in all forms of nature; that it is potential in 

46 



The Super-Icarus 

the ether, unconscious in minerals and plants, 
that it manifests itself as a group soul in ani- 
mals, and becomes self-conscious in man. 

"In the lowest forms of consciousness, the 
unconscious existence, it is the Will to 
Consciousness that initiates that striving 
impulse in nature. Change, the principle of 
Becoming, is the resultant of desire — the 
Will to Experience. 

"According to Leibniz, every monad in the 
universe is a center of force, and it is this 
dynamical view of nature that constitutes his 
main advance beyond the monism of Spinoza. 
Even Haeckel leans toward the view that the 
atoms have their likes and dislikes — thus 
placing the Ultima Thule of Science in a 
psychical realm. Schopenhauer and later 
Nietzsche defined this psychical entity whose 
striving initiates motion as Will. 

"In the higher forms of consciousness, as 
found in the lower animals, where the survival 
of the fittest is the paramount factor, the 

47 



The Super-Icarus 

Will to Live is the animating principle. In 
the still higher ( self-conscious) unity the Will 
to Power enters as in the determining factor. 

u In trying to remedy the ills of society 
one must look to the individual for improve- 
ment. We have hitherto approached the 
problem from the wrong direction. Before 
we can have an ideal society we must have an 
ideal man. The Will to Power is the activat- 
ing principle in man — it is the acme of ambi- 
tion. It must go before we can realize the 
next step in evolution. Man's selfishness, 
which is the outgrowth of self -consciousness, 
is the root of all social evil — for the state is 
the sum of the individual units. 

"It was made clear that each step of pro- 
gress has been assured through the extension 
of consciousness. In widening the degree and 
scope of consciousness we have risen in the 
scale of living forms, and have, to some extent, 
thus dominated nature. It is plain, therefore, 
that any future advance will be due to still 

48 



The Super-Icarus 

greater developments of consciousness. For 
lack of a better, we will accept Kant's dictum 
that good is that principle which can be put 
into universal application as a maxim. This, 
in itself, implies an extension of consciousness 
beyond the non-ego. Democracy, as defined 
by Edward Carpenter, is 'the rule of the mass- 
man in the unit-man.' 

"Such a doctrine is exactly opposed to the 
Nietzschean doctrine of the Superman. The 
Superman can not be the embodiment of the 
inflated ego. On the other hand, the Super- 
man is the Cosmic Man. Selfishness is not 
the attribute of the Superman. Our natural 
method, therefore, of solving social problems is 
the extension of consciousness beyond the 
present limitations; the ultimate form being 
cosmic consciousness. Such a consciousness 
is already present in a minor degree in some 
individuals. We note its presence in Tom 
Paine, who says, 'The world is my country; 
to do good my religion.' 

49 



The Super-Icarus 

''But in the coarsest and meanest of us 
such an expression is not altogether wanting. 
Somewhere in evolution, in the multitudinous 
mutations of life, this factor has been intro- 
duced, and its presence is not unnoticed or 
unfelt. We see Man opposed to Nature — 
subduing and conquering her with that in- 
genuity that has mastered Nature's secrets to 
the composition of the stars, and the formula- 
tion of laws which make predictions possible. 

"The electron of the physicist, the smallest 
unit of matter, is to be regarded as a force- 
center, or stress in the ether of space. The 
phenomenal appearances of nature are attri- 
butes of the ultimate reality, the substratum 
of matter. These force-centers must be 
polarized individualizations of the underlying 
reality of nature, whether you choose to call 
it mind or matter — it really amounts to the 
same thing, as the Pragmatists indicate. 
Further, these force-centers require some 
agency to prevent the individuals from merg- 

50 



The Super-Icarus 

ing into one. Force, to be real, requires two 
factors; it implies resistence, and it is the 
interaction between these two factors which 
underlies rhythm and Spencer's Persistence 
of Force. 

"The Will is the root principle of all creative 
activity. Cosmic will is gravitation — poets 
name it love. Will is magnetism, chemical 
affinity, electricity crystalized into matter. 
Will is the stress of consciousness. Universal 
Will or Consciousness is God, hence the 
striving toward cosmic consciousness. 

"It is consciousness seeking consciousness, 
however blindly, throughout all nature that 
originates all activity, motion and evolution. 
The desire for consciousness is the universal 
generator of forms. But this striving impulse 
involves a purposive impulse, the Will to 
Experience, in which the specific forms are 
predisposed to develop in a definite direction, 
due to the Will which manifests itself as the 
creator of forms. 

51 



The Super-Icarus 

"Man has a personal and an impersonal 
nature. A thing cannot be at war with itself, 
or the thing from which it has arisen. Con- 
flict implies a disagreement, an opposition of 
forces — in this case, of Man and Nature. 
The impersonal nature as the retarding factor 
is Nature. The other factor is the urge of the 
Becoming God in us. As man is the product 
of nature, yet an opponent who has sought to 
subdue this universal mother, we can not but 
believe it is something higher, finer, an im- 
manent idea as the yeast of consciousness, 
which has led to this conflict with brute 
nature — which has given this impetus to 
advancement. 

"The persistence of force in the physical 
realm, if carried ever into the social universe, 
becomes the Cosmic Urge — the progressive 
principle of humanity as the expression of the 
Becoming Absolute acting in ourselves in 
opposition to the impersonal nature. Reality 
is not a closed series, but the phenomenal 

52 



The Super-Icarus 

universe reveals itself as we expand, and when 
we have, in the Unity of the Infinite, attained 
the Being Absolute, the Spirit of the Universe, 
then we will directly experience the Thing-in- 
itself. 

"In so far as Socialism helps us to realize 
and respect the not-me, the man next to us, 
it promotes the attainment of the universal 
consciousness for which Walt Whitman so 
nobly wrought. It is necessary for the national 
unit, the state, to realize the world-conscious- 
ness and subdue the national consciousness 
before permanent peace can be assured. 
How true it is that wisdom is crystalized 
suffering! 

"The state is the sum of the individuals. 
As surely as magnetism is the sum of the 
forces circulating around the individual atoms, 
as surely as gravity is the sum-total of the 
stress-centers creating a tension throughout 
infinite space, just so surely is the state the 
sum-total of the individual wills. 

53 



The Super-Icarus 

"Nietzsche's condemnation of Socialism 
because it would prevent, in his estimation, 
the advent of the Superman, is unjust. Ego- 
tism is a mark of immaturity and limitation; 
it betrays a myopic, ego-centered insight. 
In the future man will come to understand 
that his quarrel is not with society, foreign 
nations, which to him represent the incarna- 
tion of his impersonal self, or with external 
forces, but that his conquest lies in the sub- 
duing of the inner nature common to all men. 

"As Carpenter says in 'Civilization: Its 
Cause and Cure,' 'We find ourselves to-day 
in the midst of a somewhat peculiar state of 
society, which we call civilization, which even 
to the most optimistic among us does not 
seem altogether desirable. Some of us, indeed, 
are inclined to think that it is a kind of disease 
which the various races of man have to pass 
through. . . .' 

"We become Individuals only in so far as 
we see our relation to the things which sur- 

54 



The Super-Icarus 

round us — it is .the warfare of the clash of 
interests which gives us conscious individu- 
ality. But now we look forward to the re- 
fusion of developed Selves into a higher social 
order. Realized statically, the love-kingdom 
of the heart is urging dynamically the creation 
of social structure. Beginning first as Feeling 
in the individual heart, its progress to realiza- 
tion in social organization (especially on the 
world-scale) is slow; but ever and again it 
may be expected to leap forward into mani- 
festation in a 'great individual,' one who will 
come to be acknowledged as a Master and a 
Savior.* 

''Time, like a mighty stream, flows on. 
Illumined in the immediate present, we find 
ourselves a part of this rolling tide of becom- 
ing — we touch the immediate realities sur- 
rounding us, we absorb the spirit of these 
realities to some extent, and as we drift, the 
origin of this coursing tide is lost in the twilight 

* "Edward Carpenter," by Edward Lewis. 

55 



The Super-Icarus 

of the past, and the future is still hid in the 
mist beyond. We are saturated with the 
spirit of the waters, we rejoice in the play of 
the waves — riding the crest of the plunging 
stream we catch the sunlight in a fleeting 
moment, and then sink into the trough of the 
essence of that succession of states which, to 
us, is time. In the minute whirlpools of this 
flowing stress the intellect takes its transitory 
life; in the shrinkage of this universal ocean 
of consciousness is formed that selfhood which 
enables the monad to view the realities out- 
side itself. Yet as surely as 'the dewdrop 
slips into the shining sea,' so this individuali- 
zation melts back into the unconscious 
vastness of the absolute. 

"Oh, would that we might stand on the 
shores of the irresistible gulf that emerges 
from the subterrene twilight of the past to 
dissolve into the dim mists of the future — 
would that, as we stood on the brink of this 
proteus, we might free ourselves from the 

56 



The Super-Icarus 

phantoms and fleeting realities fraught with 
illusions all too deeply impressed upon the 
human mind — and standing thus could 
survey the depths and infinitudes of pure dura- 
tion as it passes, and grasp the significance 
of all the parts of that vaster whole which 
encompasses All! 

"Hitherto, the energies of science were 
focused on the external world, and the chief 
occupation of the scientist has been to discover 
means and instruments to supplement the 
range and intensity of the physical organs, 
in order to enlarge his knowledge of the uni- 
verse without. This, in the long run, is the 
wrong procedure. 'The proper study of 
mankind is man' — the universe within. The 
conquest of space lies in the potentialities of 
dynamic consciousness, not in the spectroscope. 

"The consciousness of self is but a step in 
or a cross section of that vast expanse of 
evolution from the lower to the higher. Any 
expression of any cross section of this flowing 

57 



The Super-Icarus 

stream is as necessary in the transition from 
one form to another as is the form itself. 
Thus, war is the natural expression of a 
certain stage in the development of conscious- 
ness and as we tolerate quarrels in cats and 
dogs, and puerility and superficiality in child 
and man respectively so we must recognize 
selfishness, pugnacity and egotism as a 
necessary expression before a further advance 
is possible. Our consolation is found in the 
fact that where there is the greatest strife 
and friction there is the greatest advance. 
The idea of universal brotherhood was not the 
flower of Greek philosophy, but it only arose 
in that period of conflict in which nations 
were pitted against each other, the age of 
Phillip of Macedon, and Alexander, when 
men's minds were forced to the consideration 
of social problems and relations. So will it 
be in the present age of strife. Thus I assert 
the absolute and am no misanthropic Super- 
man, either." 

58 



The Super-Icarus 

"But how do you reconcile the absolute and 
relative, the finite and the infinite in space and 
time?" 

"There you go to the root of the problem. 
It is the same old problem that faced Plato 
and Aristotle. According to Plato, the World 
Soul of evil differentiates the character of the 
world of Becoming from the world of Ideas — 
but how? How are the higher and lower to 
be reconciled? How is absolute being related 
to the world of becoming? Plato never thor- 
oughly explained how sensible things 'partake 
in* the realm of Divine archetypes and 
eternal forms. 

"Nor does Aristotle clear the matter up. 
Change, according to him, is explained by pre- 
ceding change, and the chain leads back in an 
infinite regression with always a change to be 
explained by its precursor. He accepts the 
argument that motion is uniform and eternal. 
This demands a changeless change to account 
for persistence, thus he arrives at the 

59 



The Super-Icarus 

'Unmoved Mover' as actual and not potential, 
and therefore in the best possible condition. 

"Now then, if change is the realization of 
perfection, why, in the infinite past, has not 
this state of perfection been attained? But 
since with an eternity behind to work 
through, the universe of change is still far 
from being perfect, why should we not say 
that perfection in no infinite period in the 
future can be attained? 

"We may adopt several attitudes towards 
this problem. We may say with Spencer 
that there is an Unknowable residue of 
problematical stuff that is incapable of 
solution, or we may take the stand that the 
author of 'The Philosophy of the Uncon- 
ditioned' does: 'We believe that in His 
own nature He is exempt from all relations 
of time ; but we can conceive of Him only 
by means of ideas and terms which imply 
temporal relations, a past, a present and a 
future.' Sir William Hamilton believes that 

60 



The Super-Icarus 

the Absolute is not a problem to be solved by 
reason, but a reality to be believed in as 
though above reason. 

"Nor do I think that anyone has as yet 
solved the problem — though some have 
come close to it. 

"I claim to have solved the problem through 
the Fourth Dimension. Please throw away 
your prejudice for a time and don't interrupt 
me! he commanded with a sweep of the hand. 

"Idealism requires some method of recon- 
ciling the absolute and relative, God and 
Nature. I use the term Absolute in the sense 
of the Unconditioned. To conserve the su- 
preme values of free will, and escape the 
paradoxes of infinity and eternity, Bergson 
introduced Duration, which in time, is 
analogous to the Fourth Dimension in space. 

"Universal determinism denies a personal 
God. Determinism in Psychology leads to 
Materialism, and the annihilation of free will. 
This denial eliminates our highest ethical 

61 



The Super- Icarus 

values; it destroys our source of comfort and 
hope. These values must be conserved. 
Philosophic morality is beyond the average 
man, and in those who do adopt such a guide 
of conduct, it leads to a code of beyond good 
and evil which makes man a law unto himself, 
and sets up a bad example to the mediocre 
but majority mind, which will then throw 
over current religious concepts, without the 
philosophic insight necessary to the substitu- 
tion of a philosophic code of morals. On this 
point I am a Pragmatist. As Voltaire says, 
if there were no God Humanity would create 
one, and as Ingersoll says, an honest God is 
the noblest work of man. . . . Yet the 
demands of reason must be satisfied. 

"At the same time, the Electron theory has 
confirmed Spencer in his Principle of Rela- 
tivity, and determinism applied to psychology 
spells the ruin of religion. 

"Science avoids the Unconditioned by 
means of scientific and mathematical concepts 

62 



The Super-Icarus 

of the infinite, which are not infinite, but 
merely the extremes of a series extended 
indefinitely and thus approximating infinity. 
But religion cannot dodge the problem thus. 

"Thus science even bids fair to banish the 
absolute altogether. In 'The Problems of 
Science' we have a typical specimen of the 
Positivism of science to-day. Enriquez would 
put it in this manner: 'Since there are de- 
grees of relativity, we may claim to reach the 
end of our infinite series, in order to attain 
to something which shall no longer have any 
relative aspect, and which may then properly 
receive the name absolute. 

11 'An infinite series come to an end? It is 
evident that the proposition is self-contradic- 
tory. But this manifest absurdity does not 
yield in the presence of an illusion that is 
deeply rooted in the human mind. 

" 'We have seen how the wide-spread 
sophism which says that 'the relative pre- 
supposes the absolute,' rests upon a verbal 

63 



The Super-Icarus 

illusion, that conceals a process of definition 
wholly devoid of sense.' 

"Yet I say that the absolute does not rest 
upon an illusion. The statement that 'The 
absolute value of morality, then, signifies 
nothing but a larger relativity,' contains a 
subtle sophism which only science is capable 
of. Even science has its difficulties in recon- 
ciling the relativity of motion with the abso- 
luteness of force. But the way of paradoxes 
is the way of truth. ..." 



64 



The Super-Icarus 



"For myself, I do not admit the validity of 
non-Euclidian geometry, or any kind of hyper- 
space philosophizing. It seems to me the day 
of Newtonian mechanics of the absoluteness 
in time and space has passed away. Lorentz 
and Larmor have exploded your ether abso- 
lutions into the unknown. Gravitation itself 
is included within the scope of relativity. 
Someone says that the Electron theory is 
itself a direct application of the principle of 
relativity." 

"We shall see! But let me first remark that 
the fact that the first suggestion of the fourth 
dimension came from such thinkers of the 
magnitude of Kant and Gauss, and that 
Zollner and Hinton both persisted in trans- 
cending the axioms of geometry, as James 
puts it, and this of itself ought, at least to 
insure a respectful hearing. . . . 

65 



The Super-Icarus 

"Do you admit the existence of the ether 
of space?" 

"Yes, I admit it is an hypothesis to explain 
wave motion in the transmission of light." 

'This ether must pervade all space, then, 
does it not?" 

"Yes, so far as space extends." 

"But is not space infinite? Remember, we 
are arguing about what we must accept as 
fact, regardless of what such conclusions 
lead to. You certainly admit the infinitude of 
time — since you are not a Bergsonian. It 
is now impossible to consider space and time 
as separate. They are so inter-related that 
Minkowski felt himself contrained to say that 
'from henceforth time by itself and space by 
itself are mere shadows, that they are only 
two aspects of a single and indivisible manner 
of co-ordinating the facts of the physical 
world.' " * 

I began to see that there was method in 

♦"Relativity and the Electron Theory" by E. Cunningham. 

66 



The Super-Icarus 

his madness. . . . His memory was astound- 
ing. 

"Since I agree with Aristotle that our con- 
sciousness of time depends upon the percep- 
tion of motion I admit that space is as infinite 
as time is eternal." 

"Then the ether must be infinite in space?" 

"If it were not, nothing would shield us 
from the ' intolerable blaze of infinity ' — 
except a gap in the ether, which is preposter- 
ous." 

"Then the law of gravitation must hold 
throughout infinite time and space?" 

"Since matter is eternal, that necessarily 
follows." 

"Also, the ether must have the same pro- 
perties throughout space?" 

"Yes." 

"Do you conceive the ether as being con- 
tinuous or atomic." 

"It must be continuous. If atomic it would 
imply that voids exist between the interstices , 

67 



The Super-Icarus 

and all physical action would then become 
action at a distance, which we cannot admit." 

"Likewise, it cannot have gravity?" 

"No, for if it did, the ether would be 
attracted towards the larger aggregates of 
matter, and hence be denser in these neighbor- 
hoods, and if its density were not uniform 
it would not progagate light in straight lines." 

"Then in not gravitating it lacks the char- 
acteristic property of matter?" 

"If by matter you mean masses larger than 
the atom." 

"Why do you restrict the statement?" 

"Because in a unit smaller than the atom, 
such as the electron, the unit and the ether 
tend to merge into one." 

"But how can you derive a property from 
something from nowhere?" 

"I refer you to any text-book on the sub- 
ject, my mathematics fail me. Besides, I 
am no more obligated to answer the question 
than you are." 

68 



The Super-Icarus 

"But if the ether is continuous and has 
the same properties throughout space, how 
do you account for negative parallax of the 
stars, which is too frequent an occurrence to 
be explained as error in observation, but must 
be explained by means of the curvature of 
space?" 

"I do not admit the curvature of space, 
and insist that negative parallax has no 
physical significance. It is to be explained 
simply as error due to the fact that the stars 
are much farther away than we thought." 

"It is a fact of geometry that the surfaces 
of concentric spheres are proportional to the 
squares of their radii. Now then, this geo- 
metric property of spheroidal bodies gives us a 
new clue. I quote from memory Le Bon's 
treatment of the subject in 'The Evolution 
of Forces.' Let us suppose that we place a 
candle in the center of a sphere of given 
radius, and each part of the sphere will receive 
a given amount of light. Let us double the 

69 



The Super-Icarus 

radius of the sphere and this same amount 
of light is spread over a surface four times 
greater than before, and it follows that its 
intensity over any given area will be one- 
fourth of what it was before. If we treble 
the radius the intensity will be nine times 
less, and so on. . . . This law of inverse 
squares simply signifies, therefore, that the 
intensity at a given distance is inversely pro- 
portional to the square of the spheroidal wave 
propagated to that distance. This is geo- 
metrically evident, I take it. When the 
force decreases with the distance in accord- 
ance with this law, it is legitimate enough to 
suppose that it is propagated by spheroidal 
waves. Does that seem evident?" 

It did, so I said so. 

"Then shouldn't this be the case with 
gravity? Doesn't it seem reasonable that the 
law of inverse squares allows us to suppose 
that gravific waves have a form analogous to 
that of the waves of sound, light and electric 

70 



The Super-Icarus 

waves — only of almost infinitely small period 
of vibration?" 

"That does not necessarily follow, though 
it seems plausible enough, I admit." 

"But the fact that Newton's computations 
agreed with his law of gravity does not prove 
absolutely that the law is true, does it?" 

"No, not absolutely." 

"Then we have as much right to assume the 
vibratory or wave nature of gravitation as we 
have to assume the law of gravity itself." 

"It would seem so . . . though I don't 
see the point of all this . . . but wait! — 
now that I remember it, some modifications 
have been suggested by Riemann, Levy, 
Gerber, and ..." 

"Yes, but you do not admit non-Euclidian 
geometry." 

"But I was not thinking of the electro- 
magnetic constitution of matter. Even at 
that, you can prove nothing from your 
conclusion." 

71 



The Super-Icarus 

'That modifications of the theory of gravity 
have been suggested is the very point of my 
argument. To return to Minkowski: Space 
and time are complementary and inseparable. 
My own view is that they are two aspects of 
a fourth-dimensional unity. . . . Let me 
quote : 

(The devil with his quoting, why doesn't 
he argue!) 

" 'Analytically Minkowski transports him- 
self to a space of four dimensions in which 
the distinction between space and time 
vanishes. In this four-dimensional region, 
the whole of space and time are portrayed 
in one construct. . . . Thus three-dimen- 
sional kinematics becomes four-dimensional 
geometry. This relation extends further, it 
reaches the domain of mechanical quantities. 
Three-dimensional dynamics can be inter- 
preted as a four -dimensional statics. . . '." * 
(Italics are present author's). 

* "Relativity and Electron Theory," by E. Cunningham. 

72 



The Super-Icarus 

"It is a strange fact that absolute motion 
may be said to be at rest. So that in our 
world or relativity change is the law of the 
universe, yet the 'Unmoved Mover' dwells 
eternal and changeless in his four-dimensional 
statics. 

"So that when Fichte says that the phe- 
nomenal universe is the creation of the ego, 
and Bergson postulates Intuition, we may say 
that they really postulate the fourth dimen- 
sion. 

"The point made that gravitation is a 
form of vibration due to the inverse-square 
property of spheroidal bodies is a pertinent 
one. If you still have any compunctions on 
that score, let me remind you that Sir Oliver 
Lodge, as well as most other scientists who 
dare express an opinion on the subject, regard 
gravity as a strain or stress in the ether. 
Lodge concludes, Thus every cubic milli- 
meter of the universal ether of space must 
possess the equivalent of a thousand tons, 

73 



The Super-Icarus 

and every part must be squirming internally 
with the velocity of light. 

" 'Gravitation is thus supposed to be the 
result of a mechanical tension inherently, 
and perhaps simultaneously, set up through- 
out space whenever the etherial structure 
called an electric charge comes into existence, 
the tension being directly proportional to the 
square of the charge and inversely as the 
linear dimension.' * So that, as he concludes, 
all that is necessary to the explanation of 
gravity is a diminution of pressure, or the 
increase of tension caused by the formation 
of an electron or corpuscle — the matter unit. 

"But let us return to the sphere. ... A 
line is generated by a moving point, a moving 
line generates a plane, and a moving plane 
generates a solid. Any space can thus gen- 
erate its next higher space by moving in a 
new direction. Or we may restate it by saying 
that each lower dimension is the shadow cast 



* "The Ether of Space," by Sir Oliver Lodge. 

74 



The Super-Icarus 

by its higher space forms. Every axis in 
nature is the line of a departure in a new 
direction, as Novalis says. 'Men have 
really got a new sense, and found within 
their world another world, or nest of worlds; 
for, the metamorphosis once seen, we divine 
that it does not stop. I will now consider 
how much this makes the charm of algebra 
and the mathematics, which also have their 
tropes, but it is felt in every definition; as, 
when Aristotle defines space to be an im- 
movable vessel, in which things are contained 
or, when Plato defines a line to be a flowing 
point; or, figure to be a bound of a solid; 
and many the like.' Thus spake Emerson, 
the Platonist. The sphere 'A' casts the circu- 
lar *B' upon the plane 'C, and the linear 
shadow 'D' upon the line 'E\ Of what, then, 
is the sphere itself the shadow of? — the 
hypersphere? 

"If gravity takes on its vibratory nature 
because of the functions of spheres, may we 

75 



The Super-Icarus 

not regard it as a manifestation of a fourth- 
dimensional unity, and the ether as the 
'shadow' of the Unconditioned? 

"Plato's myth of the cave, in his Republic, 
thus adapts itself to a new interpretation. 
Plato's doctrine is that of an enduring 
archetypal world of ideas 'beyond the heavens' 
reflected in a world of transitory images and 
appearances. As a shadow is to the solid 
body, so is the object itself to the archetypal 
Idea. Plato defines a line to be a flowing 
point, he emphasizes the study of mathematics, 
makes Socrates draw the proof of the Pytha- 
gorean theorem from the slave, and empha- 
sizes the importance of music, which one 
writer defines as a kind of sensual mathe- 
matics, — does not all this justify us in 
believing that Plato conceived of hyper- 
space? 

"To bring this problem closer home: 
Poincare, in 'Science and Method' says, 
'It quite seems, indeed, that it would be 

76 



The Super-Icarus 

possible to translate our physics into the 
language of geometry of four dimensions.' 
He suggests such an explanation of Hertz's 
mechanics as being susceptible of such an 
explanation, and it fits in with what I have 
said of wave motion. And keep this point 
well in mind, wave motion characterizes all 
phenomena, and underlies all rhythm of 
space and time. 

"Poincare continues, 'The Milky Way, for 
instance, is an assemblage of suns whose 
motions appear at first sight capricious. 
But may not this assemblage be compared 
with that of the molecules of a gas whose 
properties we have learned from the kinetic 
theory of gases?' But in trying to explain 
gravitation as being due to some system of 
waves or moving particles, we meet with an 
objection in the fact that weight, as well as 
volume, is proportional to density. But if we 
regard density as simply another dimension, 
then this trouble is avoided. This theory, 

77 



The Super-Icarus 

however, would make it necessary to extend 
the fourth dimension to the kinetic theory, 
though it is but an implication of Poincare's 
analogy. I quote from Claude Bragdon's 
'Primer of Higher Space.' 

" 'A stream of water,' he says, 'falling 
vertically upon a plane surface tends naturally 
to spread out in two dimensions of the plane, 
setting up, in so doing, undulations in the 
shape of enlarging concentric circles, dimin- 
ishing as to depth. The rapidity of this 
lateral extension, and the force and height of 
the waves will depend upon the height from 
which the stream of water falls, that is to say, 
upon its pressure in the third, or vertical 
direction. 

" 'Carrying out the analogy, in our world 
of three dimensions the expansive force of 
gases would be due to some similar influx from 
the region of the fourth dimension, and the 
amount of pressure exerted by a gas would be 
the measure of four dimensional extension. 

78 



The Super-Icarus 

So long as the quantity of energy coming 
down from a higher world is not expended, 
there would be some degree of force entering 
by way of the fourth dimension which causes 
gas to dilate in our three-dimensional world. 
The capacity of a gas to expand comes thus 
from a four-dimensional world. 

11 'The density of solid bodies would be due 
to the same cause, with this difference, that 
they are stable, and cannot dilate, that is to 
say, they are in equilibrium with atmospheric 
pressure. As a consequence, the variations in 
the densities of bodies would be due to varia- 
tions in the force from the fourth dimension. 

" 'The fourth dimension can thus be con- 
sidered as represented by the density of 
solids, or the expansive force of gases,' and I 
might add, by gravity. 

"At the same time, it follows that the mass 
of a four-dimensional body would be infinitely 
greater than the mass of a three-dimensional 
body, that is, its density would be nil. 

79 



The Super-Icarus 

"Of the constitution of matter, Thompson 
says, 'All mass is mass of the ether, all 
momentum, momentum of the ether, and all 
kinetic energy, kinetic energy of the ether.' * 
Balzac expressed the same thing generations 
ago: 'All is the product of an ethereal sub- 
stance, the common base of several phenomena 
known under the vulgar names of Electricity, 
Heat, Light, Galvanic and Magnetic Fluid, 
etc. The universality of the transmutations 
of this substance constitutes what is com- 
monly called matter. . . . The brain is a 
retort, where the animal carries, according 
to the strength of the apparatus all that each 
of its constituent parts is able to absorb of that 
substance; and out of which it issues in the 
form of will. . . .' t 

"Further, this theory was, in a remarkable 
way, anticipated by Napoleon, the Superman 
of Nietzsche as the perfect expression of the 



* "Electricity and Matter," by J. J. Thompson, 
t "Louis Lambert." 

80 



The Super-Icarus 

Will to Power. In his diary on January 6, 
1817 we find the following: 'What is electri- 
city? What is galvanism? There lies the 
great secret of nature. It works in silence. 
I believe that man is the product of these 
fluids and the atmosphere; that the brain 
pumps in the fluids and produces life; that 
the soul is made up of them, and that after 
death they return to the ether whence other 
brains pump them." 

"Such rubbish smacks of mediaeval animal 
magnetism," I remarked. 

"Then let me refer to our greatest materi- 
alist, Haeckel, and see what he has to say. 
According to Haeckel, the vibrations of the 
elastic, jelly-like ether of space 'is the ultimate 
cause of all phenomena,' mental and physical, 
whether we conceive this ether-motion as 
vibration, strain or condensation — ('conden- 
sation' of the ether is impossible). Again, 
he says that, 'The two fundamental forms of 
substance, ponderable matter and ether, are 

81 



The Suber-Icarus 

not dead, and only moved by extrinsic force, 
but they are endowed with sensation and will, 
(though naturally of the lowest grade). ...'*■ 
"Thus we may regard Mind and Matter as 
two modes of the ether differentiated kine- 
tically, with the ether as the medium of 
interaction. Psychology can only explain by 
giving physical correlates, the cause of every 
phenomenon will always lie deeper than the 
psychologist is willing to go. The ultimate 
cause of every phenomenon lies in the ulti- 
mate constituent of the substance in which the 
modification takes place. It is simply a 
restatement of the Principle of Continuity, 
which asserts that the cause of every epi- 
phenomenon is inherent in the ultimate 
particles of the by-product. Thus, as the 
implications of Fechner's and Leibniz's 
theories must lead us to believe, mind is 
potential in the electron — and it is but one 
step from the electron to the ether. 

* "The Riddle of the Universe," by Ernst Haeckel. 

82 



The Super-Icarus 

"Psychology, 'the science without a soul,' 
indeed, without a consciousness * has cut its 
own head off, and like a decapitated rooster, 
is flopping about in a bewildering world of 
sensations. 

"The brain is a 'juxtaposition of atoms,' 
if you will, but these atoms are relatively as 
far apart as the planets of the solar system. 
They swim in an ocean of ether, separated 
by the same vast distances, relative to each 
other, that the various planets of the solar 
system are, and, as we postulate the ether 
for the transmission of light waves, so we 
must postulate a medium for the inter-con- 
nection of the atoms of the body, and espe- 
cially the brain. It is as inconceivable, says 
Huxley, that consciousness should appear as 
the result of the friction of molecules as that 
the Djinn should appear in answer to the 
rubbing of the Lamp of Alladin. Memory 



* "Creative Intelligence," by Dewey and others — essay by 
Boyd H. Bode on "Consciousness and Psychology." 

S3 



The Super-Icarus 

demands some relation between the units of 
the brain, and as by means of a stress the 
magnet influences the needle, so we may 
infer that one atom influences another. 
Memory, I assert, has its home in the ether. 
I admit that every thought and feeling of 
man is accompanied by some change in the 
cerebral tissue, yet that change is the effect, 
not the cause. The mere trace in the nervous 
system of the passage of an idea or impulse 
is like the furrow of a ship upon the sea, or 
the path which lightning cuts out in its course, 
yet it would be folly to assert that a change 
of the brain atoms causes an act of the will. 
A barbarian seeing the flash of light which 
results when the electrician throws on a 
switch would be likely to think that the 
switch is the cause of the light, whereas it is 
but the occasion. Extending the analogy, 
insanity and mental abberations are simply 
short circuits of the brain switch-board. 
The brain, like a transformer, step-up and 

84 



The Super-Icarus 

step-down, only serves as the medium of 
transmission. 

"As Sir Oliver Lodge says, 'If any one 
thinks that the ether, with all its massiveness 
and energy, has probably no psychical signifi- 
cance, I find myself unable to agree with 
him.' 

"So that, as Edward Carpenter points out, 
as a solid is related to its own surface, so it 
would appear, is cosmic consciousness related 
to self-consciousness. Bergson's view that 
the intellect is a product of the evolution of 
life, formed by a shrinkage or condensation of 
consciousness, for the purpose of endowing 
the being possessing it with the capacity of 
viewing the reality outside itself, is compre- 
hensible only when seen through the fourth 
dimensional vista — probably that is the 
reason why he is so incomprehensible to some 
people! Fechner's suggestion that every 
death is but a rebirth into a new world attains 
something more than poetic vigor. That 

85 



The Super-Icarus 

science is rapidly drifting towards this con- 
ception of the universe may be gathered from 
this reference. Dr. Saleeby, in 'Evolution: 
the Master Key' says: 'Life is potential in 
matter; life energy is not a thing unique 
and created at a particular time in the past. 
If evolution be true, living matter has been 
evolved by natural processes from matter 
which is, apparently, not alive. But if life 
is potential in matter, it is a thousand times 
more evident that mind is potential in life. 
The microscopic cell, a minute speck of 
matter that is to become man, has in it the 
promise and germ of mind. May we not 
then draw the inference that the elements 
of mind are present in those chemical ele- 
ments — carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, 
sulphur, phosphorus, sodium, potassium, 
chlorine — that are found in the cell? Not 
only must we do so, but we must go further, 
since we know that each of these elements, 
and every other, is built up out of one invari- 

86 



The Super-Icarus 

able unit, the electron, and we must therefore 
assert that mind is potential in the unit of 
matter — the electron.' This view is one that 
is not peculiar to but one individual, either. 
The principle of continuity demands that as 
much be said of the smallest unit of matter 
as can be supposed. 

"But my point that each atom is the 
expression of the Universal Will, exercised at 
a definite point, bears emphasis. Thus the 
electron, as a vorticle manifestation of the 
ether, is like a typhoon or water spout in an 
ocean, mounting upward in an ever-expanding 
spiral, to melt into the heavens itself. Of 
this geometry of points or position Poincare 
says: 'We must succeed in constructing it 
completely in the higher spaces, and we shall 
then have an instrument which will enable 
us really to see into hyperspace and to supple- 
ment our senses.' * 

" Leibniz and Lotze regard each atom as a 

* "Science and Method" by Henri Poincare. 

87 



The Super-Icarus 

metaphysical entity or monad. Leibniz 
created his Pre-established harmony to get 
rid of the parallelism of soul and body. 
Fechner's theory of panpsychism obviates 
this difficulty. Psychology denies interaction, 
but memory, regarded from the materialistic 
standpoint, as having its roots in the relations 
of the cerebral tissue, necessitates some sort 
of interaction between the smallest units 
that go to make up the cerebral tissue. If 
every atom is a center of force, then each 
atom influences the other through the lines 
of force that it creates. The psychologist 
would accuse me of being negligent of the 
physiological understanding of the basis of 
consciousness, on the other hand, I impeach 
the results of modern psychology, and de- 
nounce these theorizers as being devoid of 
any comprehensive understanding of the 
applications of physics. Physics is as legiti- 
mate a science as physiology, and its concepts 
are just as pertinent to the ultimate explana- 
tions of mental phenomena. 

88 



The Super-Icarus 

"Bertrand Russell's critical work on the 
philosophy of Leibniz brings out the charac- 
teristic features of his doctrine. To quote: 
'Hence there must be, in every state of a sub- 
stance, some element or quality in virtue of 
which that state is not permanent, but tends 
to pass into the next state.' As Leibniz 
points out, given the first term of such a series 
of successions and the law of progression, the 
remaining terms arise in order. A change of 
relative situation is necessarily reciprocal, and 
hence Leibniz is led to the equality of action 
and reaction. To him, impact was ultimately 
the only form of dynamic interaction. He 
rejected the Newtonian gravitation, as he 
agreed with Huygens against Newton that 
the phenomena of circular motion gives no 
indication of absolute motion, holding with 
most moderns that gravitation must be ex- 
plained by means of an all-pervading fluid. 
So that perfect elasticity was required 
throughout. Elasticity was required to con- 
serve Vis Viva. 

89 



The Super-Icarus 

" 'But if impact be the ultimate form of 
interaction, this answer can only serve if the 
smaller parts which receive the motion are 
themselves perfectly elastic. Impact is only 
elastic, according to Leibniz, because of a 
'subtle and penetrating fluid,' whose motion 
is disturbed by tension, or by change of 
elasticity. And as this fluid must be itself 
in turn composed of little solid bodies, 
elastic among themselves, we see that this 
replication of solids and fluids continues to 
infinity.' 

"And if it is true that it is only by putting 
elasticity everywhere in matter, then it 
necessarily follows that there are worlds in the 
smallest bodies, and that therefore there are 
no first elements, for, as Russell says, we 
must say as much of the smallest portion of 
the subtle fluid as can be supposed. To 
have perfect elasticity, a body, however 
small, must be surrounded by a fluid as 
subtle to itself as the subtlety of the body 

90 



The Super-Icarus 

is in relation to us. The point made is 
important. Any contradiction will clear 
itself up later. 

"Again resorting to analogy, the highest 
form of argument, spheroidal phenomena 
represent the cross-section of the current of 
four-dimensional bodies passing through a 
three-dimensional plane. They would mani- 
fest themselves as a principle of growth, of 
change, and as a measure of relations. Thus, 
these cross-sections, in passing through this 
plane would seem to us to be the reality of the 
world in a dynamic condition, organized into 
forms with the inherent power of change, 
growth, expansion and contraction. From 
a dynamic standpoint, the mathematical 
physicist could simplify his task, if, instead of 
referring phenomena to a set of three space 
axes and one time axis, they are referred to 
homogeneous co-ordinates — time, in other 
words, would be translated into a dimension 
of space — the fourth dimension. What is 

91 



The Super-Icarus 

time for one grade of consciousness is space 
for the next.* 

"Leibniz denies that one monad can influ- 
ence another — 'monads have no windows' — 
yet his pre-established harmony is untenable 
to modern thinkers. It does not square up 
with epigenetic processes, for one thing. 
However, I do give credence to his theory 
that man is a microcosm, a mirror of the 
universe. Now then, each space may be 
defined as that which separates two portions 
of the next higher space from each other. 
And we have said that the sphere, from a 
conceptual point of view, represents the pro- 
jection of the fourth dimension through this 
world — may we not draw the conclusion 
that each point of space, as a force-center, 
call it monad or electron, each point is the 
beginning of a pathway into and out of four- 
dimensional space. Poincare justifies us in 
this stand, and this stand justifies Leibniz's 



* "A Primer of Higher Space," by Claude Bragdon. 

92 



The Super-Icarus 

monads without windows, and man as the 
epitome of the universe. Four-dimensional 
space, as a unity variegated into the three- 
dimensional world of dynamics, must preserve 
a harmony which dwellers on the latter plane, 
not seeing behind the scenes of the stage, 
might construe as 'pre-established harmony.' 
"Evolution, in this manner, becomes much 
more intelligible. If we were to imagine a 
helix or spiral in three dimensions to pass 
through a plane it would manifest itself as a 
point moving in a circle. And, to use the 
extension of this analogy as Bragdon puts it: 
'Now imagine a Twr-Dimensional spiral 
passing through a r/^ee-Dimensional space. 
The point of intersection, instead of moving 
in a circle, will trace out a sphere. Assuming, 
as before, a complicated structure for the 
spiral (circles in spirals — a kind of 'epi-cycle'), 
its presentiment in three-space will consist of 
bodies built up of spheres of various magni- 
tudes moving harmoniously amongst one 

93 



The Super-Icarus 

another, and requiring Time for their develop- 
ment. May not the atom, the molecule (the 
electron?), the cell — the Earth itself, be so 
many paths and patterns of unchanging 
unity?' 

"Assuming such a unity in hyper-space, 
this projected on the conscious physical 
plane would manifest itself as a single individ- 
ual in different personalities separated from 
each other in time. Reincarnation may thus 
be conceived as the representation of a 
transcendental self in successive egos." 

Here I could contain myself no longer. 



94 



The Super-Icarus 



VI 



"I have never been able to convince myself 
that reincarnation solves the problem of the 
mystery of existence. A period of life, as the 
Christian conceives it, is, say, seventy years. 
The actions of the person, as determined by his 
motives, during these seventy years prede- 
termines his fate for all futurity. In order to 
get rid of Eternal Damnation, the Reincarna- 
tionist asserts a succession of lives, each, in 
the long run, an evolution or progress beyond 
the preceding life, until, at last, true spiritu- 
ality is attained. But here is the fallacy: 
Reincarnation postulates a Change occurring 
in Time — the only alternative of saying 
that the process is infinite is no more comfort- 
ing than a faith in eternal evolution. Besides, 
if reincarnation be an infinite development, 
in the infinity of the past that has preceded 

95 



The Super-Icarus 

the present moment we should long ago have 
passed the present stage. Reincarnation, 
then, is a finite process, and both the ortho- 
dox Christian conception and reincarnation 
are beliefs in finite periods of evolution taking 
place in an eternal span of time. Now any 
finite period of time, be it 70 or 70,000 years, 
is to this eternity as any other finite period 
greater or less. So far as solving the mystery 
of existence goes, it only ages the problem and 
makes it more obscure. To place the burden 
of the mystery of existence on 'Experience' 
is the most puerile attempt to reconcile an 
evil world with a supposedly good God that 
could ever have originated from an anthro- 
pomorphic race of subservient, whining slaves, 
seeking to justify the blundering ways of 
their god with that which is in themselves — 
higher even than their God! I thank my 
stars that I have not the burden of a 'sin' 
and misery cursed universe resting upon my 
conscience — as your God has." 

96 



The Super-Icarus 

"But you are simply stating the fallacy of 
Zeno. Don't you see that my conception of 
time, Duration, if you would call it so, is 
absolutely necessary in the face of the argu- 
ments you have advanced ? 

"You are, by this time, conversant with the 
general features of my theories. All undula- 
tory motion produces a symmetrical division 
of time. According to the law of individuali- 
zation, this division of space and time mani- 
fests itself in smaller and smaller units, the 
larger being but multiples of the smaller, and 
the smaller we call vibrations, and the larger, 
cycles, with a progressive series between the 
two. We note this rhythmic character from 
cosmic periods down to such cycles where 
there are known as undulations and vibrations. 
The vibrations of sound and heat are close 
to the means of which on the one extreme of 
the series we find such of the greatest periods 
as the 'birth' and 'death' of solar systems, or 
the periods of the variable stars, and in the 

97 



The Super-Icarus 

other direction the extremes of the series 
including the vibrations of light, X-rays, 
Hertzian waves, ultra-violet light, and those 
labeled 'unknown*. The period of a planet 
is simply an extended vibration when seen 
through our end of the telescope, but to the 
inhabitant of the supra-universe as he sees it 
through his end of the telescope, or micro- 
scope, rather, these planetary periods are to 
him what the periods of the infra-universe 
of the atomic solar system are to us — simply 
vibrations. Keep this point well in mind. 

"This comprehensive view of the universe 
explains the origin of matter, evolution, the 
growth of cells, valency of atoms, polariza- 
tion, crystalization, the penetrative power of 
radium emanations, rates of chemical change, 
swiftness of thought — the problems of 
ontology and epistemology will be recon- 
sidered. But it will, with reference to the 
supra-universe, also explain our relations to 
the universe at large in terms of births and 

98 



The Super-Icarus 

deaths of solar systems. All these problems 
lend themselves to an easier solution in the 
light of hyper-space concepts. And it is true, 
as Novalis exclaims, Mathematics is pure 
Religion. As the Sage of Concord says: 
'With a geometry of sunbeams, the soul lays 
the foundations of nature. . . . Whilst the 
eternal generation of circles proceeds, the 
eternal generator abides. . . . We stand 
before the secret of the world — where Being 
passes into Appearance, the Unity into 
Variety. . . . The natural world may be 
conceived of as a system of concentric circles ; 
and we now and then detect in nature slight 
dislocations, which apprise us that this surface 
on which we now stand is not fixed but sliding. 
. . . Cause and effect are two sides of one 
fact. ... St. Augustine describes the nature 
of God as a circle whose center is everywhere, 
and its center nowhere. . . . The Soul is 
progressive, it circumscribeth all things, in a 
like manner it abolisheth time and space, time 

99 



The Super-Icarus 

and space are inverse measures of the force 
of the soul.' 

"Mathematics, as Keyser says, is identical 
with symbolic logic — the age of transcen- 
dental, or non-Euclidian logic is at hand. 

"We now consider the relation of man to 
nature in view of the above suggestions. 
Knowledge arises from consciousness, and 
consciousness is always conditioned by the 
vehicle of physical perception. Thus, accord- 
ing to the constitution of man, relativity is the 
product of human values. Poincare has a 
valuable suggestion here: 'Thus the charac- 
teristic property of space, that of having three 
dimensions, is only a property of our distribu- 
tion board, a property residing, so to speak, 
in the human intelligence. The destruction 
of some of these connections, that is to say, 
of these associations of ideas, would be suffi- 
cient to give us a different distribution board, 
and that might be enough to endow space with 
a fourth dimension.' 

100 



The Super-Icarus 

"I believe that under certain conditions 
we do have access to such a dimensional 
intelligence; and the legitimacy of Intuition, 
Revelation, and I might add, of the inspira- 
tion of genius, rests upon the validity of this 
hyper-space unity concept. Poincare, in order 
to explain some curious psychological pro- 
cesses happening to himself, and which he 
stoutly maintains are not to be explained 
by means of any conscious principle, had 
recourse to a theory of his own, of the 'sub- 
liminal ego.' The part played by this uncon- 
scious work in mathematical discovery, he 
holds, is not to be disputed. It was in con- 
nection with his researches in Fuchsian func- 
tions and non-Euclidian geometry that these 
'appearances of sudden illumination' occurred. 

"One would expect that if ideas were the 
highest form of knowledge, any person ap- 
proaching closest to that state in which such 
knowledge were attainable would be the most 
likely to possess, and in some manner express 

101 



The Super-Icarus 

possession of such knowledge. In the phe- 
nomena of hypnotism, which closest resembles 
a subliminal state, so far as tests can be made, 
we find such evidence. If ideas are universal 
one would expect the reasoning of a person 
possessing them to be from these universals ; 
in other words, such a person would reason 
from premises already given, and he would 
thus use the deductive method. The objec- 
tive or conscious mind is capable of reasoning 
by all methods, inductive and deductive, 
synthetical and analytical. But the subjec- 
tive or subliminal mind is capable of reasoning 
deductively, and with the greatest accuracy, 
but it is incapable of reasoning inductively. 
It is obvious that if the 'mind' has these Ideas 
or universals, it is incapable of rising above 
them, but can reason in the other direction. 
This is not, however, the doctrine of innate 
ideas, which stimulated the ire of Locke 
so much. In but a comparatively few 
instances does such a rise in the level of 

102 



The Super-Icarus 

consciousness occur. But the individual is the 
prototype of the mass-man ; what is the genius 
of one age is the common stock of the next, 
and what is the insanity of one age becomes 
the sanity of the next — phylogenetic de- 
velopment is simply ontogenetic development 
on a grand scale. These ideas do not exist 
in the brain, nor are they localized in space, 
but they exist as archetypal forms nascent 
in the ether, and it is this reflecting ether 
which constitutes the mentality of the 
universe, and which universal repository of 
nature Hartmann termed the Unconscious. 

"Just as an electric current, immersed in a 
fluid solution, will precipitate the suspended 
chemicals into a definite form of crystaliza- 
tion, so the Intellect, meeting the proper 
percept, crystalizes the concept with the 
corresponding percept, the two meeting, there 
is a flash, they are volatilized and fused into 
one and registered in memory, so to speak. 
The Unconscious acts as the fluid with the 

103 



The Super-Icarus 

elements suspended therein. Mind and matter 
are two modes of the ether. The physical 
forms of things exist in the ether as stress- 
lines, as is proved when a broken crystal is 
recrystalized in the mother fluid in the exact 
form of the original crystal. Mayer's experi- 
ments with the floating magnets proves the 
same thing. The brain is the intermediary of 
the two. The 'Ideas' of things existing in 
the ether are as accessible to the mind, as a 
mode of the ether, as they are to matter. 
Memory is thus a tension of the brain atoms 
in the ether. In using the same magnet in 
photographing the lines of force as they ar- 
range themselves visibly in the iron fillings 
we always get the same arrangement of lines, 
or the same image, so, when we create the 
same tension in the brain atoms, by atten- 
tion, that has been produced at any time in 
the past we get the same image which pro- 
duced the preceding tension. 

''That the forms existing in the mind 

104 



The Super-Icarus 

through the ether absolutely correspond to 
the external forms denies the evolutionary- 
processes of the latter. In truth, both forms 
evolve, or rather, the two modes progress, 
but the mental archetypes precede the physi- 
cal, though these changes exist in the Uncon- 
scious preceding their advent into the con- 
scious. The evolution of the modes is the 
basis of the 'continual elaboration of the 
ever-new,' both are fluidic and adjust them- 
selves to each other. 

"Nor do these changes immediately happen 
in the individual, and thus spread from man 
to man, but in leaps or rhythms these advances 
are precipitated into humanity, manifesting 
themselves in history in such a manner that 
we definitely mark off certain periods as 
characterized by certain tendencies, which 
gives history that peculiar epoch-appearance. 
This process is one of Duration, not of Time. 
The sorrow is that we are so low in the scale 
of evolution. 

105 



The Super-Icarus 

"As long as our intelligence is that of 
relativity, the problems presenting them- 
selves are incapable of final solution, and in a 
mental universe of 'absolute intelligence' 
these problems will not exist. One glimpse 
of a lower cross-section of evolution should 
be sufficient to convince one of the folly of 
drawing final conclusions on any aspect of 
philosophy, religion, or science — the prob- 
lems which perplex one grade of intelligence 
resolved themselves into new forms for higher 
grades, and the best that we can do is to Will 
to Believe in the ultimate conservation of 
'Good' as the quintessence of a 'best possible 
universe,' and place our faith in the un- 
realized possibilities of 'Creative Intelligence.' 
Because of the peculiar impulse of the Indi- 
vidual in contrast to the inertia of Society, 
we have ignored the revelations through the 
hyperspace consciousness as a possibility in 
the securing of the freedom of the masses. 

"What do we know of the mind that we 

106 



The Super-Icarus 

can say thus and so; as yet we have but 
touched the crests of consciousness, and that 
basic reality underlying and uniting the 
ripples of the 'flowing stream' remains 
unsounded. We merely see the shadows play 
across the field, like clouds chasing themselves 
over valleys and hills. The mind is something 
more than a camera photographing the 
panorama of reality and reproducing realis- 
tically. 

"From the standpoint of psychophysical 
parallelism, mind and matter are but two 
phases or sides of the same fundamental 
reality. From this standpoint it makes little 
difference whether you call it a physical or a 
psychical force operating through the body. 
Nerve-force is akin to electricity, and elec- 
tricity is vibratory — then is not nerve-force 
also? And if the nervous energy of the body, 
to the physiological psychologist, is the real 
force of the body, then it must be of a vibra- 
tory nature, much as light and heat are. As I 

107 



The Super-Icarus 

have proved all physical forces in the universe 
are vibratory, for I believe in the essential 
unity of all forces according to the principle 
of continuity and the correlation and evolu- 
tion of forces, and as physical and psychical 
forces are identical in the body, so far as the 
psychologist is concerned, it follows that 
psychical force is vibratory also. Or in 
other words, the only difference between the 
psychical and the physical is a difference in the 
periods of vibration, or a kinetic difference of 
tension. This essential unity of all forces is a 
scientific concept which has been held by all 
scientists since the formulation of the law of 
the conservation of energy, Youmans, whom 
I have quoted, and Faraday, in particular, 
were very definite on this point. It is incon- 
ceivable that a non-spacial, immaterial, and 
non-localized psychical force should act upon 
a physical force — it would violate the law 
of the conservation of energy and invalidate 
the principle of determinism — but my con- 

108 



The Super-Icarus 

ception evades both these difficulties. It is 
no more inconceivable than that different 
forces of different vibratory intensities should 
be translated into the consciousness at the 
same time. He who forces me to explain 
how different vibratory intensities — physical 
and psychical — can exist in the same mind 
at the same time and interact, at the same 
time forces the explanation of the simultan- 
eous existence of sound and light vibrations 
in the same mind, home upon himself. 

"So then, we may regard mind and matter 
as two differentiated states of the ultimate 
reality of nature, the ether. The more rapid 
the period of vibration, the greater is the 
density, the permanence, and stability of the 
medium. The end of this series, 'the highest 
relativity,' as Enriquez puts it, or the supreme 
monad, as Leibniz would say, would thus 
become the Platonic archetypal world of 
Ideas, if it is by the approach of the relatively 
vibrating mentality to the absolute vibration 

109 



i 



The Super-Icarus 

that we approach these Ideas in their purity 
and perfection. 

"This stand only emphasizes the necessity 
of the introduction of the hyper-space concept. 
It might well be insisted that such a thing as 
'absolute vibration' does not and can not 
exist. We might ask Leibniz how his Supreme 
Monad, which is God, is related to his series 
of monads. He cannot be out of and inde- 
pendent of the series, yet to be in the series, 
even as the supreme end, takes away the 
individuality and unconditioned nature of 
Him, and He becomes nothing but a 'higher 
relativity.' Berkley falls into the same error 
when he asserts that God is the sustaining 
ground of the system of percepts in finite 
beings. If God creates these finite wills, as 
Berkley maintains, then we may well ask 
how the Infinite is able to act upon the Finite, 
how the Unconditioned 'partakes in' the 
Conditioned and relative. It might be argued 
that since God is all-powerful he can effect 

110 



The Super-Icarus 

these things through His own nature — but 
that is only begging the question: God, him- 
self, is amenable to the laws He creates — 
else He is not the origin of Law. This, as I 
have consistently maintained throughout, 
is only possible by means of the introduction 
of the Fourth Dimension. 

"The psychological origin of 'causality/ 
as Hume saw it, thus becomes an important 
factor in the explanation of things. Titch- 
ener's refutation of Wundt's tri-dimensional 
theory of feeling is no objection at all. That 
a fourth dimension should be introduced into 
perception is not unheard of. Life and experi- 
ence are inseparable. Space is Experience, 
and experience is assimilated into conscious- 
ness through the Fourth Dimension. Such a 
theory secures its validity in the Webber- 
Fechner law of tension as the condition of 
consciousness. The mutations of tension 
constitutes the mutations of consciousness. 
Thus it is that Instinct, Impulse, Habit, 

111 



The Super-Icarus 

Intelligence, and Intuition, represent the 
transformations. In each case the law of 
inertia bears upon the state — it is as hard 
to attain to an intuitive state as it is to over- 
come a fixed habit. 

"Reality is not independent of ourselves, 
it is dynamic and continually unfolding and 
being made by our interests and desires. 
Reality, like dreams and mythologies, is a 
wish fulfillment, but due to an unconscious 
impetus, a cosmic urge, in which the will mani- 
fests itself as the creator of forms. The realiza- 
tion or unfolding of the consciousness con- 
stitutes the revelation of consciousness, which 
is the supporting ground of reality, or the 
system of ideas, according to Berkley. Had 
Berkley recourse to some 'cosmic self,' as 
Holt phrases it,* to some underlying bed of 
the Unconscious, he would not have fallen 
heir to the solipsistic implications of his 
philosophy. 

♦"Cosmic Relations," by Henry Holt. 

112 



The Super-Icarus 

"Mutation may thus be defined as the 
introduction of a novel feeling, impulse, or 
idea, according to the relative position in the 
scale of evolution, which enter into the indi- 
vidual because the latter, in his rise through 
successive planes of vibration, synchronizes 
himself with those higher impulses or 'ideas' 
in nature, existing in the ether. As Youmans 
points out, men are the products of move- 
ments, and scientific discoveries are the 
products of the age — if the respective 
discoverers of the law of gravity, evolution, 
the conservation of energy, the electron 
theory, etc., had not lived, someone else 
would have discovered the same things. 
It is more proper to speak of things as being 
'in the ether' than 'in the air.' This is the 
basis of 'mob psychology.' Perhaps, if the 
zoologist were to look for the causes of things 
from within, instead of looking for the external 
determinants of things, he might get closer 
to the real significance of the puzzling nature 

113 



The Super-Icarus 

of mutation. To return to the preceding: 
For those dwelling on different planes of 
vibratory consciousness a correspondingly 
different reality forms the basis of their 
experience. Just as water permeates a sponge 
and air permeates water, so there are different 
planes of reality interfused within one another. 
"If you have secured my idea of the rhythm 
of motion you may be able to understand 
me when I say that time is a cross section of 
the flow of vibration towards eternity, that 
space bears the same relation to infinity ; that 
absolute vibration, or infinite vibration in 
rapidity of periodicity, is the fourth dimen- 
sion — spaceless and timeless. Whatever 
inconsistencies may arise take their origin 
in the attempt to interpret the fourth dimen- 
sion, spaceless and timeless, in terms of three 
dimensional concepts — but such are the 
deficiencies of language. Not only does 
the principle of relativity demand a revision 
of the space concept, but it compels a new 

114 



The Super-Icarus 

view of time, and thus introduces the notion 
of curved time : 

"The principle of the curvature of space 
and time confirms the idea of rhythm and 
periodicity. I suppose Spencer dissolves 
the ultimate cause of his Rhythm of Motion 
into the 'Unknowable.' This cyclic process 
in nature has given rise to the 'Everlasting 
Return,' which, far from being as original as 
Nietzsche supposed, is as old as Stoicism and 
beyond. But instead of being cyclic, the 
process is spiraline, each succeeding lap being 
a little in advance of the preceding one, in 
the long run. If there is anything which the 
concept of hyper-space will do, it will be to 
destroy the faith in the fate of recurring 
cycles — the 'Pathos of Time.' All processes 
are creative; Nature never quite repeats 
herself, to paraphrase Emerson. Hegel incor- 
porated this thought in his Dialectics. 

"We look into the immeasurable realms of 
space filled with orbs of beauty and spheres of 

115 



The Super-Icarus 

flame, and we discover this rhythm. The 
spiraline nebula hints at rhythm, variable 
stars brighten and pale at regular intervals; 
planet, satellite, and comet, revolve and return 
at proportional intervals; the seasons, mag- 
netic variations, and sun-spots, come and go. 
The great tides of the ocean, the lungs of 
man, the heart-beat of the breast, and the 
cilia of the animalcule, play to and fro with 
rhythmic diastole and systole. From the 
precession of the equinoxes, upheavals of 
continents and the recessions of waters, to the 
vibrating strings of air columns in the pro- 
duction of sound measured by the thousandths 
of seconds, and the vibrating of the ether in 
the production of light or Hertzian waves — 
all flow by rhythmic rule. 

"Spencer agrees with oriental conceptions 
concerning these processes. He says: We 
find reason for thinking that these various 
equilibrations which bring to a close all the 
forms of evolution we have contemplated 

116 



The Super-Icarus 

there must be an equilibrium of afar vaster kind. 
When that integration everywhere in progress 
throughout our solar system has reached its 
climax, there will remain to be effected the 
immeasurably greater integration of one 
solar system with other such systems. There 
must then reappear in molecular motion what 
is lost in the motion of the masses, and the 
inevitable transformation of this motion of 
masses into molecular motion cannot take 
place without reducing the masses to a 
nebulous form. Thus we are led to the con- 
clusion that the entire process of things as 
displayed in the aggregate of the visible 
universe is analogous to the entire process 
of things as displayed in the smallest degree.' 
"Keeping in mind the idea of waves or 
rhythms as being but different time and space 
units, to us, and that this rhythmic effect is a 
property of spheroidal manifestation, a pres- 
sure from another direction, or in other words, 
that the fourth dimension manifests itself 

117 



The Super-Icarus 

in three dimensions as a series, a waxing and a 
waning, a rhythmical nature which underlies 
the principle of relativity, the following 
statement found in Poe's poetic effusion, 
Eureka, becomes almost prophetic. He feels 
warranted in announcing that 'the law which 
we have been in the habit of calling Gravity 
exists on account of Matter's having been 
irradiated, at its origin, automatically, into a 
limited (preferring tautology to misconcep- 
tion) sphere of space, from one, individual, 
unconditioned, irrelative, and absolute Par- 
ticle Proper, by the sole process in which it 
was to satisfy, at the same time, the two 
conditions, irradiation, and generally-equable 
distribution throughout the sphere — that 
is to say, by a force varying in direct propor- 
tion with the squares of the distance between 
the irradiated atoms, respectively, and the 
Particular Center of Irradiation.' 

"This increased pressure upon the con- 
sciousness from a new direction demands a 

118 



The Super-Icarus 

mode of expansion in a new direction. All 
things now-a-days are being explained in 
terms of stress, pressure, and strains. For 
example, in physics, polarity, induction; 
and, as Hinton conceived it, the electric 
current is a four-dimensional vortex. Putting 
the question thus, I make answer: 



119 



The Super-Icarus 



VII 

"The history of civilization is the story of 
the conquest of man over nature. It is the 
romance of the subjugation of elements, the 
utilization of ever-finer mediums of motion. 
In the morning dawn of civilization primitive 
men dealt with solids. His implements were 
solids, bodies that were easily accessible and 
that could be fashioned with no great skill, 
such as stones, wood, clay, and the natural 
products which lent themselves to his service. 
Then, as the sun of civilization rose, man found 
in liquids a readier servant. He discovered 
the manifold uses of water, and trusted him- 
self to barks, and thus extended the horizon 
of his conquest over nature. This was an 
important step : The bringing of space within 
the domains of consciousness is concomitant 
with the advance of the intellect. Water 

120 



The Super-Icarus 

then served as a propelling force, and we find 
the primitive water mill utilizing the energy 
of liquids. Then man learned the use of gas. 
Wind was a much finer condition of matter, 
and as such, it lent itself to a greater adapta- 
bility of service. Wind became the motive 
power for the propulsion of ships, as well as 
mills. The value of this step cannot be over- 
estimated. As a progressive step it brought 
the extremities of the world into contact. 
It widened the scope of man's knowledge; 
it extended the field of vision, and enlarged 
his consciousness. Steam, an invisible, elastic 
gas, overshadowed the range and power of the 
coarser medium, air. Then fade the wonders 
of steam beside its more ethereal supplanter, 
electricity. Streaming through the ether of 
space, from sun to earth,* this Proteus of 
power bids fair to subdue the whole universe 
and lead in the conquest of space. f 



*Proven in the Synchronism of the Auroras and the Sun-spots. 
t'The Coming Force," by Max Heindel. 

121 



The Super-Icarus 

"Man's progress is commensurate with his 
medium. The facility of the medium is its 
subtlety. Consciousness in refining progres- 
sion has embodied within itself in successive 
order, solids, liquids, air, steam, and elec- 
tricity — each successive medium, from 
solids to electricity, has proved more subtle 
and ethereal than its precursor. What of the 
future? Is the medium of the future advance 
of the human race dependent upon the dis- 
covery and utilization of an energy as much 
finer and more rapid in transmission than 
electricity as electricity is subtler than 
steam? What is this fore a? 

"As I have persistently maintained, this 
force is the dynamic force of mind — the 
conquest of space lies in the realization of the 
potentialities of consciousness. Each point 
of space, the electron, is the starting point 
of a pathway into, and the termination point 
out of, four-dimensional space, as someone 
says. The psychic phenomena so hard to 

122 



The Super-Icarus 

understand from the ordinary standpoint are 
more easily understood from the hyperspace 
concept. The kingdom of Heaven is within 
you. 5 

"As Fournier concludes then — the visible 
universe is only one in a chain of similar 
universes contained one within another, 
and differing only in the size of their elemen- 
tary constituent particles. The atoms of one 
universe are the suns of the next universe , 
the electrons are its atoms; and space and 
time are relative. 

"Thus it appears that it makes little differ- 
ence in which direction we go, we are always 
faced with the same problem — it is a waste 
of time to look for ultimate particle, or a 
continuous fluid of a certain density or elas- 
ticity; we can never hope to arrive at any- 
thing ultimate, from a three dimensional 
viewpoint; and, as Fournier points out, nei- 
ther the microscope nor the telescope will 
solve the riddle of the universe, but 

123 



i 



The Super-Icarus 

psychology; and finally, . . . 'we are grad- 
ually drawn to the conclusion that mind is 
everything, and matter but an expression 
of the universal mind.' " * 

"But permit me to interpose an objection. 
If your ether is infinite in extent and con- 
tinuity, has the same properties throughout, 
and is incompressible, I doubt whether it is 
able to vibrate at all." t 

"Your objection is valid, but my ether is 
not ultimate. This does not invalidate the 
fourth dimension, however, for I believe we 
have just as much reason to believe in *N' 
dimensions as we have in four. Time and 
space, you must remember, are subjective, 
they are a matter of experience. This is as 
hard to understand as it is for Leibniz to 
explain how the perception of space is latent 
in unextended centers of force. 

"If the electron is a vortex, and if a gram 



*"Two New Worlds," by Fournier. 
f'The Riddle of the Sphinx," by Schiller. 

124 



The Super-Icarus 

of hydrogen means a 6,800,000 horse-power 
stress in the ether, mathematicians assure us 
that a perfect homogeneous ether could not 
withstand such a pressure and retain the 
density that is necessary. The mathemati- 
cians say, however, that five such ethers of 
varying densities would fit the situation.* 
This bears out the theory of universes within 
universes. Man has within himself, latent, 
as many existences as there are ethers, which 
accounts for 'multiple personality,' perhaps. 
Keep in mind that the infinite is a three- 
dimensional concept, even though every 
tenuity implies that of successive tenuities. 

"Out of the strife of the universe, the pain 
of the inner conflict in the soul of man, out 
of the war of nations and the agony of the 
death struggle, into the Supra-world a living 
being shall be born. As we watch the growth 
of the amoeba under the cover-glass, the 
Supra-man will watch the growth of galaxies 

♦"Matter and Some of Its Dimensions." by W. K. Carr. 

125 



The Super-Icarus 

and systems. 'Above the Battle' I feel the 
joyousness of a new freedom. What can 
you who are given over to the bitterness of 
earthly despair know of the joy of spiritual 
insight? I preach the Supra-man, not the 
Superman! 

"As Fournier's eloquence puts it, motion 
means change or experience. 'Inertia means 
habit. . . . No universe exists which is 
entirely unconnected with this of ours. We 
know that the fruit of our slightest act goes 
thundering down the ages, that nothing is 
effaced, that everything is of infinite and 
eternal consequence. ... Man emerges 
from each successive conflict stronger, saner, 
and better, more assured of the ultimate 
victory, fitter to reap the fruits of it.' 

"In the end reason does not play the impor- 
tant role we assign to it. Rhythm, or the per- 
sistence of force, underlies the psychical as 
well as the physical. As Carlyle confesses in 
'Sartor Resartus' his spiritual status was not 

126 



The Super-Icarus 

determined by his mental outlook so much 
as his spiritual condition influenced his course 
of reason. The spiritual life is far more subtle, 
and eludes our grasp, yet like an electric 
current, the spiritual life fluctuates in rhyth- 
mic motion, and induces corresponding 
changes in the mental life, and this will con- 
tinue until a place of rest is determined on 
either plane. But the empiricist can only 
lay his hands upon the coarser manifestation, 
the fluctuations of the spirit elude him, so 
he says that the personal changes are the 
result of logical inferences, which then react 
upon the spiritual nature. In reality the 
two are simultaneous, and the logic pursues 
unconsciously the path of the spirit. Thus 
our course of reason is predetermined by the 
subtle path traced out by the spirit." 

"But such a philosophy is pregnant with 
pessimism as profound as that of materialistic 
determinism." 

"Not from the reincarnation theory. It is 

127 



The Super-Icarus 

a determinism, but a spiritualistic and opti- 
mistic determinism that engenders hope and 
faith. There is always that possibility of a 
free expression, an absolutely creative and 
free act from the standpoint of hyperspace." 

"Your emanation theories and reincarna- 
tion seem to me to provide for a fate that 
would stagger even the Wandering Jew. 
I will never forgive the power that brought 
me into being, could I say there be such a 
responsible power. Your high-handed phil- 
osophy draws only this admission from me : 

"When Shelley's Prometheus had learned 
to forgive the power that chained him to the 
mountain of suffering he negated the power 
of the furies to torment him. 

"Heraclitus says that it is the balance of 
opposites that creates the permanence and 
harmony of the universe. It is the balance 
of the centripetal force of egotism and the 
centrifugal force of tangential pantheism 
running into cosmic emotion that is the origin 

128 



H 



The Super-Icarus 

of the inner harmony which arises from the 
consciousness of being in tune with the 
eternal evolutionary processes of nature. 
Either tendency carried to the extreme results 
in disillusionment. To be happy one must be 
common. The golden mean between egotism 
and cosmic consciousness, that is, the path of 
the masses, is the solution of happiness. 

"Christ on the one hand, Nietzsche, the 
Anti-Christ, on the other — both were cruci- 
fied. We are the extremes, Humanity the 
means. 

"But for myself, I prefer the present life of 
disillusionment, I am most happy when most 
miserable, for then my theories are proved. 
I scorn the path of 'the incorrigible mob of 
humanity,' as Schopenhauer did. 

"Illusionment is the yeast of consciousness. 
Life is a pantomine on the stage of the 
theater of nightmares, where the dream-imps 
have their entrances and exits. It is the drama 
of the ego on the stage of consciousness, with 

129 



The Super-Icarus 

the settings of a dream inspired illusion, and 
our little life is rounded with a sleep, I hope. 

"A good course in experimental psychology 
would serve to dissipate the mysticism of your 
hazy conceptions of the universe. Your 
views are purely hypothetical, and lack any 
experimental basis. I refuse to become an 
accomplice to the mental abberations of 
Bolyai's intellectual abortions, himself insane. 
I refuse to believe in your amoeba-God, who, 
in his expansions and contractions, reminds 
me of a goldfish successively swallowing and 
vomiting the same particle — and for no 
more apparent reason. Think you I have the 
least desire to become merely a sucker in one 
of the arms of your octopus-God as he pene- 
trates his oozy tentacles into the profundities 
of space and sounds the hollowness of the 
depths in his gropings? And that is 'Experi- 
ence,' the 'Will to Consciousness!' What a 
selfish squid your God is, anyway!" 

Here there was a transformation in Min- 

130 



The Super-Icarus 

nette, and I seemed to be facing a part of 
myself! . . . 

"I am the summation of the suppressed 
good in your life. In me all the wounds of 
the victims of your acidulated philosophy 
seek utterance and redress. I am your better 
self. Think you that you can as much as 
smother one iota of yourself — that you can 
annihilate any part of your personality without 
replacing it? In the unconscious abyss of 
your nature is the linked-up experiences of 
your past life. The good tendencies, the 
better thoughts, the impulses of altruism, 
suppressed, stifled, starved — but not for- 
gotten, they all stand before you, trans- 
humanized, representing what you might 
have been. I stand before you to level the 
impulse of the accusation, Thou hast mur- 
dered thy better self against you. On your 
own hands drips the blood of your own 
murder. No more from the ruins of the 
Buried Temple shall the restraining cry of 

131 



The Super-Icarus 

justice seek to stay the hand of the baser 
impulse. The curse is on your own heart — 
He that exalteth himself shall be humbled — 
thou shalt lose thyself because thou hast not 
given thyself to share with another, and like 
a crumbling, rotten shell thou shalt decay in 
the dissociation of thine own personality, 
to become the habitat of evil things and vam- 
pires haunting human wrecks. Thy self- 
created Nemesis has come to claim its own." 

Like a phantom form swallowed up in some 
all-devouring mist, Minnette was dissolving 
into a vapor. And surely there echoed from 
the abyss of hell as the words hastened the 
dissolution : 

" When we dream that we dream we are 
near waking,' and I claim my rightful self. 
I am a Superman, and I say to Hell with your 
four-dimensional verbiage, you Theosophical, 
vibration-mouthing apostle of the absolute! 
Back into your mortuary you seven-headed 
dog of Hades!" 

132 



The Super-Icarus 

And as the wings of the time spirit beat 
upon the cage and the curtain fell upon the 
stage, the cry of insanity arose as the apotheo- 
sis of pessimism: 

" 'Icarus, poised for flight through the 
heavens, fell headlong into the depths of the 
sea. Reason, discouraged, sinks into the 
depths of the unknowable.' " 



133 



. 



The Super-Icarus 



VIII 

I drink my beer, glance at my watch — I 
am astounded! 

"Waiter, how long have I been here?" 

"You just came, Mein Herr, only five 
minutes ago." 

"Time is a curious thing," I remark to my- 
self as I leave, "I would have thought it was 
an eternity — and only a few seconds!" 

I hasten to my room, take up my Bible, 
dust it off, and read the book of Job. Then 
all night long, with my Freud and Hartmann 
at my side, I revise, annotate, and elaborate 
my theory of the Unconscious. . . . 

With the coming of dawn I close my work. 
. . . Notice how the light filters down 
through the seething maelstrom of cloud 
formations, like a cataract disporting itself 
among the misty half concealed forms, and 

134 



The Super-Icarus 

running into streamy volutes and rivulets! I 
draw the curtain, thus shutting out the 
intruding light. . . . 

In the dusky gloom, surrounded by silence 
and loneliness, my thoughts drift towards the 
damnable subject, like driftwood sucked up by 
some hellish maelstrom. I retrace each step 
of the black logic — My God! is there no weak 
link in the adamantine chain of reasoning? 
... . The sum of the forces which constitute 
the universe is constant. We cannot suppose 
these forces to diminish in their sum-total, 
even in the smallest degree, for if this were so, 
the sum-total of cosmic force would have been 
exhausted long ago, in the infinity of time that 
has preceded the present moment. Neither 
is it possible for the sum-total to increase, for 
this would violate the principle of the conser- 
vation of energy. 

In the reactions of forces, in time, various 
combinations will result, one combination 
the resultant of preceding combinations which 

135 



The Super-Icarus 

in turn serve as the cause of succeeding com- 
binations. An equilibrium of forces can never 
be attained, for if that were so, the balance 
would mean death, with nothing to revive 
activity. The chances of a combination of 
momentary equilibrium is assured by virtue 
of the law of universal determinism, for time 
is infinite and the sum- total of cosmic force 
is determined. Thus in the eternal process of 
evolution, the same combinations occur and 
recur, and the process is like a gigantic wheel 
revolving eternally in space and time.* 

"Man! thy whole life, like an hour-glass, 
will return and will ever flow back, each one 
of these existences being separate from the 
other by the great long minute of time 
necessary in order that all conditions which 
gave thee birth may be reproduced in the 
universal cycle. And then shalt thou find 
again every suffering and every joy, and every 
friend and every foe, and every hope and 

*"The Philosophy of Nietzsche," by Chatterton Hill. 

136 



The Super-Icarus 

every error, and every blade of grass and 
every joy of sunshine, and the whole order 
of things. This cycle, in which thou art an 
atom, reappears again. And in every cycle of 
human existence there is an hour, one supreme 
hour, in which, at first one individual, then 
many, then all, attain the consciousness of 
that most powerful of thoughts — the Ever- 
lasting Return of all things ; and in each case 
humanity attains through that hour of 
midday." 

The Fourth Dimension or the Everlasting 
Return? Strindberg had his Swedenborg, 
has Feuerberg Minnette? Again the accusa- 
tion confronted me: "Thou hast murdered 
thy better self." " 'Better Self!' — I have 
no better self ; I am what I am — did I create 
myself?" The sentence in the Inferno 
again presents itself, "in the passionate desire 
to do myself an injury, I commit moral 
suicide. ..." 

In the sombre and gloomy laboratory, the 

137 



The Super-Icarus 

vulture of remorse eating into my vitals as 
the fitful fire flickers and dimly illumines 
the darkness, relentlessly pursued by the 
implacable vengeance of my evil genius, and 
in the sombre aroma emanating from a soul 
overtaken by a self-created Nemesis — finally 
to be swallowed up in a gulp which yawns like 
a gloomy pit of darkness, the darkness of a 
soul, lifted — "nevermore" — here in the 
chaos of things, I prepare my apparatus, 
strong in the hope of success of my experiment 
to create life. . . . 

I stir up the ashes in the fireplace and 
place my crucible in the smelting furnace. 
In the white heat, glowing with perspiration, 
I fire my flint to white heat, and in the process 
open up another wound and the blood 
sputters upon the white crucible and adds a 
human flux. I plunge the glowing flint into 
the prepared water to pulverize it. The silex 
thus reduced, I saturate with muriatic acid, 
and in my nervousness upset the acid bottle. 

138 



The Super-Icarus 

The mixture I then place in a jar, suspend a 
piece of flannel in the solution so as to extend 
over the one side, and thus by capillary 
attraction, the solution is slowly filtered into 
a funnel to drip upon a piece of ironstone from 
Mt. Vesuvius, upon which latter lie two 
wires from either pole of a battery. . . . 
In twenty days there will be life! 

And in the ghostly room of phantoms, 
where the shadows chase the flames across 
the whispering draperies, there sounds the 
steady dripping, dripping . . . dripping 
through the attenuated silence, of the acid on 
the ironstone. . . . 

I fancy I hear the voice of the sea, and the 
melancholy wash of sobbings the slumbering 
egos of a thousand Icaruses awoke: 

In the dim and haunted Thule of consciousness 
Fancy spins with aery fingers the threads of time and 

space, 
And on the loom of destiny the patterns of reality 

entwines, 

139 



The Super-Icarus 

Like the fugue of a spook sonata on the musical shuttle 

of the liminal — 
Marionette — like flashing from out eternity, 
The soul through stained glass vistas plays 
Its mosiac of death hues over the threshold. 



Gnomic hands have touched the sleeping Proteus to 

life — 
A spiritual nomad plunged into the whirling depths of 

dream-dramas: 
Brooding nonentity! heir to a myriad personalities 

am I . . . 
No Beatrice to guide the errant ego, no soothing balm 
Of love, to still the effervescence of a soul on fire, 
Or mute the imp-like improvisations of the sublimate 

of memory. 

Mists of twilights, like the muffled fall of snow, 

Slowly settle and encompass all, 

In the soundless echoes of the floating shadows of the 

dusk: 
I hear the sea intone his ancient monotone, 
Reverberate the metamorphosis of melodies 
In deep-toned resonance of surf-surge soundings . . . 
A chill breath sweeps across the leaden ocean; 

140 



The Super-Icarus 

The frost flakes melt into the cold green brine, 
And like the patter of tears, falling drop by drop, 
They echo dissolution — penetrating the whispering 
silence of the death-doom of the sea. . . . 

In twenty days there will be life, I mur- 
mur. . . . 



141 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

No great originality is claimed for the 
ideas herein set forth. Wherever possible 
the sources have been indicated, though in 
every case such a method was undesirable. 
However, I wish to acknowledge the following 
books as the chief sources: 

"The Grammar of Science," by Karl Pearson. 

"Melomaniacs," by James Huneker. 

"The Ether of Space," by Sir Oliver Lodge. 

"A Primer of Higher Space," by Claude Bragdon. 

"Four Dimensional Vistas," by Claude Bragdon. 

"Matter and Some of its Dimensions," by William 

K. Carr. 
"The Philosophy of Leibniz," by Bertrand Russell. 
"Problems of Science," by Frederigo Enriquez. 
"Science and Method," by Henri Poincare. 
"The Evolution of Forces," by Gustave Le Bon. 
"Relativity and the Electron Theory," by E. 

Cunningham. 
"The Riddle of the Sphinx," by Schiller. 
"The Philosophy of Nietzsche," by Chatterton-Hill. 
"Two New Worlds," by Fournier. 
"Egotism in German Philosophy," by Santayana. 
Articles in "The Electric Experimentor." 

142 



